Hawthorne Studio
HAWTHORNE STUDIO
PRODUCTORA + Part Office
CATEGORY
Extension
COLLABRATORS
Ruy Berumen, Diego Velazquez, Tessa Watson, Spencer Fried
YEAR
2020
PHOTOGRAPHS
Taiyo Watanabe
AREA
17 m2
CLIENT
Rachel Fine and Christopher Hawthorne
ARCHITECTURE
Carlos Bedoya, Victor Jaime, Wonne Ickx, Abel Perles, Jeff Kaplon, Kristin Korven
CITY
Pasadena
ARCHITECTS
PRODUCTORA , Part Office
STRUCTURE
IDG Structural Engineering (Farshid Behshid)
COLOR CONSULTANT
Jessica Fleischmann (Still room)
CONTRACTOR
Behr Construction (John Mills)
COUNTRY
United States
Text description provided by architect.
This small studio in the garden of a historic residence in Pasadena, California, houses the library of architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne.
Upon leaving his full-time position at the LA-times in 2018, he brought back his collection of books to his house in Pasadena.
And asked us to re-think a small structure behind the carport in his garden:
it had to serve as a reading and writing studio.
Still, it needed to function as well as a small guest-unit when required.
The design consists of a single continuous blue element that incorporates the flexible storage for books, a desk, and access to a small bathroom, defining a clear horizon with the irregular pitch roof volume.
At the same time, the studio characterized by these blue bookshelves wrapping around its rectangular space, the pill-shaped bathroom surrounded by an uninterrupted grid of white square tiles.
Light filters into the bathroom through a single glass clerestory window.
It generates a visual continuity between the two interior spaces while not allowing the humidity of the shower to reach the books.
The studio opens up towards a patio in the garden that serves as an outdoor extension of the writing studio.
