Big Island, Hawaii
Inspired by the vast arid plain of Hawaii’s Big Island together with the golden-green grass spring from the crumbled bed of black lava rock and the lacy Kiawe trees scattered, Greg Warner and his team at Walker Warner Architects designed the vacation home ‘Hale Mau’u’ in this setting and decided to fully embrace the quiet beauty of this unique landscape.
The 2.9-acre site had several innate qualities — such as its location at the end of a cul-de-sac and its long driveway approach — that allowed the team to create what architect Greg Warner refers to as “an illusion of isolation.”
In his words, “This site is unique in its ability to capture the ocean view and mountain view simultaneously. Not all parcels get that. The arrangement of the 4,817-square-foot compound had to do three things: catch the mountain view, catch the ocean view, and then block the view of the neighboring houses.”
A single raised boardwalk, floating respectfully above the ground, forms a linear axis pointing towards the mountains on one side and the ocean on the other. This pathway runs through a grassy courtyard, and around three sides of this central space the long, low hales are loosely clustered, like a village. On the fourth side of the courtyard lies the swimming pool, with a view of the ocean beyond, and the island of Maui rising up on the horizon.
With this open attitude, they bought in immediately to the idea that a home on the dry side of Hawaii could provide circulation between rooms entirely on the outside, using covered walkways that wrap around each of the individual structures.
The first building is the main hale (2,318 square feet), which contains the shared spaces: living room, kitchen, and family room. Passing through this building there is the courtyard.
All of the main rooms, including the bedrooms, are equipped with large barn doors, so that when fully opened there is little distinction between inside and out. These doors were fabricated with gapped boards so that when they are closed for privacy or shade, fresh air and light can still filter through.
The living room has this feature on both sides, allowing the landscape to sweep through the house from the mountains down to the sea.
Perhaps the most striking and original visual element of the project is the roofs, which are long gables with eaves designed to be narrow at one end of the building but wide at the other, carefully oriented to provide extra shade where it is most needed.
Project: Hale Mau’u vacation house
Architects: Walker Warner Architects
Design Team: Greg Warner, Thomas Clapper, Dan Baciuska, Matthew Yungert, Boyce Postma,
Darcy Arioli
Landscape Architects: David Y. Tamura Associates
Builder: Metzler Contracting Co. LLC
Photography: Matthew Millman
