Seeds Cottage

Barbara Campagna (BPS ‘84)

Photo Credit: Bernard Andre.

Photo Credit: Bernard Andre

James Gwise is an architect and is currently on sabbatical from Noll and Tam in Berkeley, Calif. He holds a BPS from the University at Buffalo and a Master of Architecture from the University of California, Berkeley. In the I990s, he completed residential work as an architect and carpenter, and educational projects with David Bartlett Associates and CSDA in San Francisco and Dhaka, Bangladesh. Later, he worked as a senior associate at Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, with projects at Apple’s Infinite Loop Campus, the University of California-San Francisco, and Apple flagship stores. He has also independently engaged in residential design and tenant improvement projects on Apple’s Infinite Loop Campus and other Silicon Valley sites.

Seeds Cottage

Seeds Cottage is an exercise in joining a love of detail with a broader connection to nature. Designed in collaboration with an industrial designer and an artist, the Cottage seamlessly connects its inhabitants with surrounding landscape and the distant views of the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay. Inspired by Eichler, the cottage’s steel structural elements and thermally broken steel framed windows open the house outward; interior walls clad with reclaimed old growth redwood create a warm and embracing environment. Board-formed colored concrete anchors the Cottage to its site.

Project Credits: James Gwise Architect, p.c. (architect); Christopher Stringer and Betsy Page Smith (owners and collaborators); Gregory P. Wallace SE (structural); Melinda Morrison Lighting (lighting); Flack and Kurtz (mechanical and plumbing engineer); Louis Ptak Construction (contractor)