Opa Architecture’s Softie, A One-Of-A-Kind Californian Home With Cloud-Like Formations

The Modernist-style home with its sharp angles and lines was a little too severe for the owners, so they enlisted the firm to ‘soften’ it, by transforming the walls of the interior spaces into more organic, amorphous shapes. Speaking of the project, the firm has said: “Boxes are better when they’ve been melted: curving walls, animated surfaces, organic arches and vaults replace right angles.” Why can’t architecture be more like nature, they ask—changeable, varied, and uninhibited? The concept is manifested visually in different forms throughout the home, starting with the front and back entrance, with cloud-like steps appearing to seep out of the doors. Inside, moments of softness are encountered unexpectedly, where stairs, walls, and floors seem to melt and fuse into one. Lastly, a cloud-like installation suspended above a sheltered terrace provides the owners with “a release from the conformity of the world outside.”