Oz Residence
Stanley Saitowitz Natoma Architects
Redhorse Constructors
9781964490106
200 pages
Oscar Riera Ojeda Publishers Llc
Overview
The latest installment of the Oscar Riera Ojeda Publishers Masterpiece Series focuses on Oz Residence by the award-winning Stanley Saitowitz and Natoma Architects, built by Redhorse Constructors. This stunning residential property in Atherton, California, is based around interlocking volumes of concrete and glass in which a gravity-defying minimalist aesthetic is employed to ensure effortless functionality and make the best of the property’s stunning views over the San Francisco skyline.
Featuring in-depth critical analysis, including of the often overlooked but crucial role of the constructor in facilitating ground-breaking architecture, as well as stunning photography, plans and diagrams, this book provides a comprehe
Author Bio
Aaron Betsky is a critic living in Philadelphia. Previously, he was Director of the School of Architecture and Design at Virginia Tech and President of the School of Architecture at Taliesin. Mr. Betsky is the author of over twenty books on those subjects. He writes a once-weekly blog for architectmagazine.com, Beyond Buildings. Trained as an architect and in the humanities at Yale University, Mr. Betsky has served as the Director of the Cincinnati Art Museum (2006-2014) and the Netherlands Architecture Institute (2001-2006), as well as Curator of Architecture and Design at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (1995-2001). In 2008, he also directed the 11th Venice International Biennale of Architecture. His latest books are Fifty Lessons from Frank Lloyd Wright (2021), Making It Modern (2019), Architecture Matters (2019) and Anarchitecture: The Monster Leviathan.
Stanley Saitowitz was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, and received his Bachelor of Architecture at the University of Witwatersrand in 1974 and his Master’s in Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley in 1977. He is Professor Emeritus of Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley. He has held several other prestigious academic positions, including the Elliot Noyes Professor at Harvard University GSD, the Bruce Goff Professor at University of Oklahoma, Norman, as well as teaching at UCLA, Rice, SCIARC, Cornell, Syracuse, the University of Texas at Austin and the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. He has given more than 250 public lectures in the United States and abroad. His first house was built in 1975, and together with Stanley Saitowitz|Natoma Architects Inc., has completed many buildings and projects. He has designed houses, housing, master plans, offices, museums, libraries, wineries, synagogues, churches, commercial and residential interiors, memorials, urban landscapes and promenades. Amongst many awards, the Transvaal House was declared a National Monument by the Monuments Council in South Africa in 1997, the New England Holocaust Memorial received the Henry Bacon Medal in 1998, and in 2006 he was a finalist for the Smithsonian Cooper Hewitt National Design Award given by Laura Bush at the White House. Four previous books have been published on the work, and articles have appeared in national and international magazines and newspapers. His paintings, drawings and models have been exhibited in numerous galleries and museums.
David Warner is the founder and owner of Redhorse Constructors (1981-present). For the past four decades he has been working on new urban formations around sustainable and resilient infrastructure and construction systems, serving as an advisor to startups that are creating new materials and systems for this new urban design intent. For instance, Redhorse has been selected to be the construction advisor for Ecoblock, an urban sustainability project whose partners include NASA and the California Energy Commission (CEC). This will be the first-of-its-kind block to demonstrate neighborhood-scale solutions to urban resilience, including energy and water efficiency, a communal solar-powered microgrid, and shared electric transportation. The project is led by UC Berkeley.
David is the co-founder of Human Needs Project (2010-present) with Connie Nielsen, a collaboration of academic and industry leaders who are in partnership with local communities to address the lack of basic services common in underserved urban populations. HNP’s project in Kenya, the Kibera Town Center, provides basic services (water, toilets, showers, laundry) and empowerment services (business skills training, microcredit, WiFi, health kiosk, green marketplace) to over 800 people per day, demonstrating that clean, local energy can empower vibrant and sustainable community centers. HNP has deployed energy systems with the Rockefeller Foundation. With grant monies, HNP’s market based poverty solution concept has been reviewed by Johns Hopkins University for scale up potential.
As a result of David’s interest in new technologies, materials and concern for the environment, he has acted as technical advisor on a number of projects, including Sir David Adjaye’s submittal for the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago and Sir Richard Branson’s project for island development and sustainability focusing on low cement concrete recipes. In 2006, David co-founded Above Board Technologies, which built a pilot factory in Canada to prove that waste wheat could be used to compose a structurally rated panel to compete with plywood. In 2007 his efforts in sustainable construction and the implementation of green technologies in residential projects earned him the title Builder of the Year by the NAHB (USA region). David collaborated with Ojjo on a patent, which has installed municipal-grade foundation systems for the Gemini solar project, the largest in the U.S.
With a focus on green building, David has turned Redhorse into one of the nation’s premier custom home builders, receiving a number of awards from the AIA, projects published in Scientific American and Architectural Digest, including achievement awards from local and industry organizations. David’s career has ranged from building sophisticated architectural structures, high performance recording studios, Island energy infrastructure, and biodynamic ranches. Having worked in all these arenas, he brings the combination of technology, infrastructure, construction and art into a unified process where material selection and system performance are blended. In 2023, David was awarded a patent for his Plank System, a non-concrete foundation which has established a new form of exoskeleton for the future of housing that has less embodied energy, fast deployment and is resilient to climate impacts due to its engineering properties and low-cost design. David was able to showcase the Plank System concept at a ribbon-cutting event at the University of California, Davis in May 2024 with California leaders in building, tech, academia and policy making in attendance.
David received his undergraduate degree from the College of Natural Resources at the University of California, Berkeley in 1976 and his teaching credential in Biology from San Francisco State in 1977. He has been an advisory board member at UC Berkeley College of Natural Resources Advisory since 2015.
