envelope a+d
envelope a+d is a collaborative design firm inclusive of outside disciplines and individuals. Our relationships, within the studio and in the wider world, begin with a respect for and a desire to engage people’s strengths, skills and experience. We are deep listeners, critical thinkers, thoughtful interpreters and prolific generators of ideas. We seek to inspire rather than dictate and, while our design vision organizes the process of transforming ideas into material form, we actively solicit the thoughts of our clients, the skilled makers of our work, and other creative actors.
Our vision is both subtle and ambitious: the reconceptualization of modes of living and building focused on the fundamentals of human perception. We advance new models of public/private space and posit compelling visions of the emerging urban condition. We create an immersive architecture that seeks to alter people’s relationships to each other and heightens awareness through intelligently disrupting the normative condition. In our work, architecture is a framework for transformation rather than an object of consumption.
We are motivated by our clients and by their ideas. We choose to take on projects based not on construction type, but on the collaborative potential of the client relationship. We seek out highly engaged clients who have a strong, clear world-view, are passionate about what they do and what they aspire to, and are interested in forging an active, creative partnership.
featured work
Slow Food Nation Coffee Pavilion The Coffee Pavilion at the Slow Food Nation Taste Hall is conceived of as a filter for experience. Three sheer fabric enclosed Coffee Halls remove the visitor from the activity of the larger event. These tasting chambers offer a more intimate taste experience and allow visitors to focus on the cup in their hand, the nuances of the brew, the discussion with an expert.
Pizzeria Delfina Inspired by a field trip to the birthplace of pizza, Delfina's pizzeria is an interpretation of the best of the Neapolitan Pizzerias, which are at once plain, urban and functional. A white-tiled floor and wainscot are a crisp textural container for the quartersawn oak bar and banquette. Honed slate wall panels comprise one full wall of the dining room and display the changing fare of the day.
Clipper Street Residence: The gingerbread of the existing Victorian house is collected under a blue-black monochrome. Space Invader makes his mark on the architectural concrete base for the tongue of the new stair. The cyan painted door calls out entry to the residence above, a new service station door to the garage and studio below.
Washington Street Residence A home for an art collecting family, the project parameters were to make no visible alterations to the front (traditional) facade of the house while completely renovating the interior to create a modern open living space and housing the client’s extensive collection of contemporary art. The design seeks to create a heightened level of engagement by blurring the line between normal living and art experience.
Washington Street Residence Bathing is constructed as a displayed event within the vitrine of the shower enclosure, while a similar translucent vitrine contains the water closet. Changing and bathing functions articulate their own materiality: tile and stucco for bathing and a warm cherry wood wrapper for changing.
Octavia M+N: In the context of runaway housing costs in the San Francisco Bay Area, we propose a building comprised of “minimum existence” individual living and/or working units. Recognizing that buildings and families change over time, our proposal also envisions the potential expansion of units by combining single units to make larger, multi-room units.
Octavia M+N: The facade displays the heterogeneous nature of individual habitation by giving control of privacy, digital projection and solar control systems to the inhabitants. Adjustable sun-shades create a wrapper extended three feet from the building skin. Fixed, operable and sliding clear and translucent glazing systems define the envelope at the edge of the conditioned space.
