Between mountain and ocean

Attracting an Honor Award from the American Society of Landscape Architects awards, this dramatic landscape design draws on its elemental surroundings

The award-winning landscaped journey through this property ends gray

Sculptural and spacious, this landscape design draws on blue

For this home landscape by Lutsko Associates, the brown

Comfortable and connected – this landscape design draws brown, gray

Serene and spacious, this landscaped outdoor space won gray, brown

"A sequence of spaces emerges from a cleft brown

Serenity and long views rule in this award-winning brown

An infinity edge pool links to the ocean

Designed by Lutsko Associates

From the landscape architects:

Project Statement

This single family residence on Hawaii’s dry, volcanic Kona shore draws on the elemental forces that shaped the land to contextualise its material design and embed human aesthetic experience within the landscape.

The site is on a transect from a mountain top to the ocean, two extremes of the Hawaiian landscape. The design team collaborated to develop a series of indoor-outdoor living spaces that trace the narrative from mountain to ocean, taking cues from Hawaii’s geological and cultural history.

The material choices serenely distill the unique colours and textures of the surrounding landscape.

Beginning on the mountain side of the site, a sequence of spaces emerges from a cleft in lava bedrock, proceeds through a freshwater oasis-like interior courtyard, finally opening out to an expansive view of the ocean.

The visitor’s journey terminates at the pool deck where the pool emulates and seemingly merges with the vast ocean beyond.

Awards Jury comments:

"Created in the point of transition between mountain and ocean, this serene vacation retreat in Kona on Hawaii Island is a finely crafted microcosm of geology, landscape, and culture. Movement through the property is a journey through a sequence of spaces inspired by the flow of the elemental forces of lava and water toward the Pacific.

"The progression of experiences begins with a driveway cut through a 10-foot-high channel of lava rock, moves through a contemplative interior courtyard with reflecting pools mimicking ponds that form in lava formations, passes through the house itself, and finally ends where the negative-edge pool melds seamlessly with the ocean beyond."

See the full project description