38 ARCHITECT | DESIGN | BUILD
The way indoors is found by a short
stroll down a slender hallway that,
within a few steps, segues one from
the outside world to a place carved out of three levels of sunshine, nature and
minimalist ease. There are two bedroom suites on the ground floor; two more,
including the terraced master suite, on the top floor; and a middle floor dedicated
to airy and uncluttered lounging, dining and kitchen spaces.
"When you walk in, the house disappears and you float," says owner
Don Caverhill, who commissioned Pali to build the home after spotting an
Architectural Digest feature of an award-winning residence the architect
designed on Stone Canyon Road. Caverhill—a creative soul and a businessman
whose earliest career was that of a teenage founding member of the Kingsmen,
and whose first record was the 1963 smash "Louie, Louie"—provided input
to dial in the final details of Pali's original design, which sold Caverhill
at first sight.
Rooms in the Caverhill Residence are atmospheres, and moving through the
home is an experience of shifting through changing scenes drawn by light and
perspective. "There's almost an intangible quality of good architecture that's hard
to put in words," says Doe, summing up the phenomenon. "But when you walk in
you can feel it." And floating is an apt description of the effect in this house.
One's immediate perception of it is not formed by sight but of experience;
a feeling of being in a place where the natural surroundings have been neatly
folded in, and because of it, the entire space is animated.
Doe points to the fenestration, or the way glass is organized with the house,
as one of the attributes that form the overall effect. "We see a rhythm and a balance
to the whole statement, and that's why it looks so natural," remarks Doe. It's this,
along with the network of terraces and balconies—some semi-enclosed to filter
the elements and shape mood—plus the glass-lined, open spaces sculpted in pure
white set against contrasting soft-grey floors, concrete and finished to a velvety
sheen, that are chief among the features that make up the sensory kaleidoscope.
S W E E T D I G S
FIRST
IMPRESSIONS
