Contemporary Living by McClean Design

Book excerpt: Hollywood’s most sought-after architects are synonymous with the quintessential California lifestyle. McClean’s second Rizzoli book explores sixteen ultra-modern residences completed over the past five years. Rigorous, elegant, and impeccably detailed, McClean’s houses are the embodiment of livable modernism and set the stage for every aspect of California living. The residences range from a remodeled classical mansion in San Francisco, to waterfront houses and serene oases that seem to float above the flats of Los Angeles, with vistas extending from mountains to the ocean. Since its founding in 2000, McClean Design’s focus has been on creating home sanctuaries that open to the best views. From the structure to plantings, lighting, and furnishings, there’s a free flow of space, through the house and out to the horizon. The quiet authority of McClean’s houses exerts a calming influence. There’s a sense of formality and spareness in the architecture, a reduction to essentials, serving not as a constraint, but as a foil to the landscape and the relaxed character of the interior spaces; wood strip floors, cabinetry, and natural stones add warmth, as do the soft furnishings in neutral tones. The book includes floor plans and explanatory essays and notes by the architects on common themes throughout their work.