Contending With A Steep Site: A View Of Wy'east (Mt. Hood)

Did we mention that we bought this property sight unseen? We did get a video tour of the property before the purchase, and we remembered the location from hiking and biking around it the previous summer. But we didn’t get to visit the land until the following summer. 

Being at the land in-person we fully understood two key things.

1. Our property’s defining feature is its dramatic slope, and the lack of horizontal space would dictate the home’s form. Instead of fighting gravity with a massive, earth-moving foundation, we accepted that buildable space would be extremely limited–there is barely any horizontal space.

2. The view from the top of the property reveals an inspiring peek of Mt. Hood. The mountain, which is invisible from the lower parts of the property (and was never disclosed as a selling point), revealed itself on our first visit.

You can’t force a house onto a site like this one. You have to listen to the land. Instead of fighting gravity with a massive, earth-moving foundation, we worked with it.

The steep site and a desire for the top bedroom to achieve a view of the volcano dictated a simple form.