Kuth/Ranieri Architects

Kuth/Ranieri Architects Byron Kuth and Elizabeth Ranieri

With texts by Ila Berman, Mitchell Schwarzer, Rodolphe el-Khoury, and Aaron Betsky

Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, Chicago Princeton Architectural Press, New York

Contents ix xi 1

Preface, Byron Kuth and Elizabeth Ranieri Acknowledgments Introduction, Ila Berman Projects:

4 16 26 36 46 54 68 80

Nob Hill Residence Park Presidio Residence Russian Hill Penthouse William Wurster Renovation Hillsborough Residence Private Residence and LEF Foundation Offices / Gallery Guesthouse / Gallery Lodi Bunkhouse Essays:

93 98 106 108 112

“Kuth/Ranieri’s Performance of Modernism,” Mitchell Schwarzer “No Obstacles: Notes on Martyrs’ Square and Other Roofscapes,” Rodolphe el-Khoury Industrial Fetish Fabrications: The Body in Repose “Fields of Fetish: Kuth/Ranieri’s Disturbances,” Aaron Betsky Proposals:

166

Calistoga House Malama Learning Village CAMP: A Gateway Proposal for the Contemporary Art Museum at the Presidio AIDS Memorial Grove Harvey Milk Memorial Car Climate Clock Martyrs’ Square Mission Bay: A Proposal for a Green District Identity Folding Water: A Ventilated Levee for a Living Estuary

170

Project Index Timeline

174

Awards

175

Selected Bibliography

177

Contributors

178

Profiles

179

Studio Members

118 124 132 136 140 144 148 154

Nob Hill Residence San Francisco

The house is sited on a narrow alley that transforms

Like the plan, the facade responds to the

from street to garden at the building’s front door. The

site and context with the transformation of typical,

project falls between the city grid and the organic

typological elements specific to urban residences in

nature of the San Francisco landscape. Vistas from the

San Francisco. The bay window, entry, front-facing

house include Pacific Heights, the Golden Gate Bridge,

garage door, and street-side roof terrace are folded

and the distant hills of Marin County to the north. The

into a singular assembly of clear sealed mahogany

planning of each floor remains open to the views, with

panels and ledges. The regimented order of the

the central living spaces bracketed by perimeter cores.

horizontal ledges is set in contrast to the inflection

Wall surfaces are expressed as cabinetry, concealing

and modulation of the facade’s planar surfaces.

and containing stairs, storage, and baths; surfaces

The facade’s interplay of regular and indeterminate

unfold, slide, and disappear, actively signifying and

geometry relates the Cartesian orders of the city to the

responding to the programs they serve.

exaggerated topography of its landform.

SKIN/surface: The finely articulated skin transforms the dimensionality of the neutral planes of modernism into the directionality of the continuous folded surface. This woven surface oscillates between frame and fill, its rhythmic seriality acting to simultaneously synthesize and expose difference. The compression and expansion of horizontal striations that trace this skin, and the subtle local inflections of its surface, imbue space with a corporeal thickness that converts the faciality of the facade into a new material body.

–I. B.

Sections, railing detail

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Project / Essay title

Axonometric, parallel streets in San Francisco

Site plan

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Project / Essay title

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Circulation axonometric

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Project / Essay title

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Plan, first level 1. Kitchen 1

2. Dining

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3

3. Living room

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10’

20’

Section

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Nob Hill Residence

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Nob Hill Residence

Plan, second level

2 1

3

1. Guest suite 2. Master bathroom 3. Master bedroom 4. Roof terrace

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10’

20’

4

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Project / Essay title