Etched into the hillside, Tsontakis’s design captures views from every room and level. To the east and west shine the lights of the booming West Valley. Moonlit preserve views are to the north and south. And mom and dad have great views of the boys playing soccer and riding their bikes in the courtyard, which wraps around to the front driveway.
Tsontakis’s contemporary look protects against datedness. Balancing clean lines with curves, the home reaches out to the mountain site with covered patios downstairs and up. To provide day lighting and also protect against excessive heat gain, large butt-glazed window walls upstairs and downstairs preserve the views but protect the windows.
Further tying the home to the hillside, Tsontakis clad the front and side walls with ancient stone concrete tile and used stacked stone around the front entry walls. For highlighting, his signature two-story columns carry diamond-shape horizontal plates; the roof and beam cladding is copper. Lightening the massing, he placed transparent glass railings on the upper covered balconies, which face the city-light views.
“The children love it,” says the husband, a doctor at one of the local hospitals. “They always want to have their friends over because now they have enough space to run around.” A basketball court on the driveway also keeps the group occupied.
This is a kid-friendly house inside, too. On the second floor, adjacent to the two bedrooms the three boys now share, is the play area. In this room, the youngest also takes piano lessons. Because the home is large, there’s a lot of room (and rooms) for activities. In fact, it’s the hands-down favorite among the kids’ friends for hide-and-seek; and once a year, on their birthdays, the celebrant gets to ride the elevator, which opens up to a bridge over the two-story dining room. “The children fill up the home and make it feel warm and cozy,” mom says.
Despite its size, practicality, warmth and comfort for family and friends of all ages guided the home’s visioning. “Between our careers and raising our boys, we lead hectic and busy lives, so we wanted our home to be our refuge and source of relaxation,” the husband says. “We built the home with the premise that this is our ‘final’ home in which we would raise our boys, so [we] tried to think long-term to accommodate both their needs and ours.”
They also considered their parents, who might need to move in with them: Hence the guest house, which, although attached to the home, is still on the preserve end of the courtyard, offering privacy.
For everyday living, the family wanted a split-level great room with a sturdy sofa able to withstand the antics of young boys, a home theater, a study, a kitchen with a built-in breakfast area with dinette seating, a laundry area and an auxiliary butler’s kitchen. The latter kitchen is great for entertaining and the special requirements for heavy-duty specialty cooking, as the family enjoys preparing ethnic foods from India and elsewhere. It’s equipped with warming ovens and a wine refrigerator for large groups.
Also for entertaining, the formal living and dining rooms provide ample space for the adults to isolate themselves yet still monitor the children. A dual fireplace between the family and formal dining room makes these rooms particularly inviting in winter. Just outside, the adults can break out to two small covered courtyard patios, which rest under the two-story courtyard overhang. They can also enjoy a water feature and fire pit.
