words and photos by Scot Zimmerman
Last week I extended my best effort to attract a big blanketing snowstorm by featuring photos taken in the snow. While still hopeful big snows will still arrive, this week I am thinking about being somewhere else other than the Wasatch Back.
The first home is along the beach of the Florida Panhandle. The photo from the home’s deck captures the Gulf, the thatched cabana house with a bar, and a zero-edge serpentine swimming pool that cries, “party!”
The drama of the exterior cannot eclipse the interior with the sweeping curves and glass of architect Arthur Dyson’s design. On the practical side, the home is designed and built to withstand hurricane-force winds and has self-cleaning glass.
Also on the Gulf along Florida’s Panhandle is the upper deck and single-pillared pergola of one of my most favorite homes in Seaside, Florida. The design is by Robert A. M. Stern Architects, and is one of only a scattering of private homes designed by the firm.
Staying in Florida, but traveling over to the Atlantic Coast is a design by architect Derek Vander Ploeg along the Inland Waterway in Boca Raton. The deck cantilevers over the inland waterway, and evenings the manatees visit the water’s edge. Frank Lloyd Wright’s concrete buildings influenced the design, and the architect experimented with what is possible applying the design influences with modern materials and building techniques.
On the Pacific Coast is Frank Lloyd Wright’s only seaside home. He designed it in the late 1940s for the Walker Family on one of the few building lots on the ocean side of the drive in Carmel. The face of the home looks out to sea like a ship. Located on the Carmel Beach, it is often photographed by visitors.
This Santa Monica Beach home captures the Southern California lifestyle. The unique design by architect Steven Ehrlich features a roll-up glass garage door that exposes two levels of the home to the breezes and sounds of the beach. Buffering the home and the beach is a deck elevated for semi-privacy that makes for a perfect perch.Â
I amenjoying this retrospective trip to the beaches of Florida and California so much that I may continue the journey next week. It all depends on getting some great snow so I can take winter shots for my clients and try out my new back-country skis without marking them up with rocks. Let it snow.
–
To learn more about Scot Zimmerman, visit his website. Click here for more Photo Friday.