Alki Retreat

The owner of this house came to McNelis Architects with a ho-hum '50's house on gorgeous grounds and an interest in Christopher Alexande's Pattern Language which is a surprising thing for non-architects to know about. She was also interested in some Japanese concepts observed while living in Tokyo and feng shui. Midway through the design process we settled on the idea of a tower office for her husband, a Navy Captain and helicopter pilot, as a way to take advantage of the spectacular setting but keep the overall size of the house under 2,500 square feet.