All but one of the images I have displayed here are by a professional photographer I commissioned in the late 90’s to use in my old “Office Brochure”.  Though I now have retired my license, I still have tons of brochures and I still like to show others some of the “building types” of architectural projects I have done.  On occasion, I still do architectural commissions for other people and for myself. – both commercial and residential.  I hope you like the small representation, shown here of my old work?  When I had to decide what I would spend my photography budget on, I split it among 10 representative projects. Each represent a group of like types to help express my design abilities when interviewing for a new job. Over a period of 47 years, I have designed over a thousand different projects from old and new single and multi-family residential, 28 financial institutions, 3 hospitals. 10 restaurants and a variety unusual custom buildings.  I am proud of all of my efforts that I felt benefited those communities, individuals, businesses and the built environment.

14-UNIT APARTMENTS, PACIFIC GROVE, CA I take pride in this representation of one of my many career apartment designs. My client wanted 15 units, but the most knowledgeable within the approval process thought I would be lucky to get 9 units approved so near to the downtown and city hall. I intentionally asked for 15 units, knowing that the council was always inclined to take away something. The original site for most of the 20th Century had a large, 2-story Victorian and a very popular nursery. The nursery was long gone but the old Victorian was still in the SE corner. It would have been tragic to demolish such a fine piece of the city’s history not to mention political suicide. I had a client with an empty lot not far away and convinced them to take the free offer, pay only for moving it and dropped onto a pre-finished, new foundation and lower level garage/laundry/shop and then totally renovated into modern amenity perfection. It was a win-win proposition. This apartment building is actually three-story with the center excavated down to provide hidden parking garages on the lowest level. There are 12 – 3-bedrm. units and two 1-bedrm. low income units. I believe the mix affords both resident and community a nice social-economic mix by integrating both housing types. The existing concrete retaining walls around the perimeter allowed for the easy inclusion of this lowered interior courtyard. The Victorian architecture is a slightly updated style in the town’s cherished Victorian Vernacular architecture, of which this site is surrounded by. But using modern materials and detailing.

3-STORY OFFICE BUILDING, PACIFIC GROVE, CA This building represents one of the many small office buildings I designed in many cities that try to fit in architecturally, yet not trying to copy the existing neighboring architectural styles. I intended this to look similar to what I called a “Boston Warehouse” type style. The unique part of this design that made it extremely challenging (and also fun), was the tiny lot size. The bare lot was 25′ wide by 75′ deep, bounded on two sides by a 10′ wide city access easement (Side and Rear). It also had a 100 year old wood structure (Originally a pre-auto horse stable) to the South. The conditions meant more stringent and difficult Fire Code, Building Code and Exiting requirements. All those being met along with seismic-designed strength and still allowing for usable square footage for tenants.
FANDANGO RESTAURANT, PACIFIC GROVE, CA Representing one of the ten restaurants I designed over my career, is this Fandango. It was located within 100 feet of my former office and I knew the two owners – Pierre and Marietta Bain, who still own and run it today. Their friend and owner of Seagate Drives also wrote a book about the owners and the restaurant. This particular building had a series of additions and remodels over the years, beginning with a small, insignificant little building facing 17th St. that became the entrance to the building.
PACIFIC GROVE LIBRARY, PACIFIC GROVE, CA I partnered with my former employer (Jim Lockett) in the late 70’s to create a much need enlargement of early 1900’s original Carnegie Library. We wrapped the new addition around the South-facing entrance of the old building and gave the appearance of Spanish Architecture, which is also a very commonly used theme over the entire Monterey Peninsula. The three East-facing windows were salvaged from the old building and enlarged as well as restored. I believe the city has recently remodeled the entire building and I am anxious to see what changes have been made. This represents one of many public buildings in my portfolio and I am pleased to say that Jim and I gave the city quite an expansive addition for very little money through the structural methodology we selected.
RESIDENTIAL ADDITION AND REMODEL, PACIFIC GROVE, CA This photograph is representative of the many, many single family additions and remodels I did all over the Monterey Peninsula and many other cities around the state. What I am particularly proud of is how we were able to save all of the near 100-yr. old Victorian 1-story building and then replicate a relatively large and inexpensive second floor addition. The original boulder fireplace was unable to be re-used, but we created the same look using lightweight concrete boulders over wood framing and pre-fab metal fireboxes on both floors. The windows on the second floor are fiberglass made to emulate the original first floor windows.
40-ROOM MOTEL, MARINA, CA Two things I can say with pride about this particular project is; I was the first architect to obtain approval from all of the various agencies and feuding non-profits after three unsuccessful attempts over 11 years. I carefully and painfully found what each wanted and got the necessary approvals to make my clients development come true. Here, we tried to use the Monterey Spanish Colonial Style prevalent in the Monterey / Salinas area and to step the building down the hill in an effort to minimize its profile looking West from Highway one. I also hired a local Landscape Architect that promised and delivered drought-tolerant native plants and landscaping wanted by the various agencies. It is no longer a Comfort Inn but is still heavily used.
LARGE RESIDENCE ADDITION AND REMODEL, CARMEL, CA This rather large residence faces South, overlooking the Carmel Mission immediately below and in the distance, Point Lobos (The inspiration for R.L. Stevenson’s Treasure Island). The original 1-story house was slightly under 3,000 square feet and we added about 3,200 sq.ft., in what the owner called her Federalist Style. All the windows were custom made by a large national window company and shipped as designed and ordered. The various fireplaces were capped with custom designed and made copper sheet metal chimney caps like the one in the upper right hand. This shot at twilight was of the rear, south facing second floor and the many expansive decks we also incorporated.
SINGLE-FAMILY RESIDENCE, CARMEL VALLEY GOLD AND COUNTRY CLUB I show this image of a custom designed residence to show two things. One, that I could actually design a usable home on an unwanted wedge-shaped lot (that faced the 8th fairway). And two, that I could depart from the older, nostalgic styles so prevalent on the Peninsula and design something of a contemporary nature. We successfully managed to hide the gutters and downspouts as well as the normally obvious garage (Far right side). The entire interior of this custom “spec” home features beautifully created open beam wood ceiling and extensive used of custom woodwork that the developer/contractor was known for.
RESTAURANT INTERIOR, PACIFIC GROVE, CA The brand new interior of a former coffee shop interior was to satisfy the new owners desire for a Central American theme. It was then called El Cocodrilo, the Old Europe and now Passionfish I do believe. Everything you see in this image was designed by our office. One of charges, was to find ample places to display the large collection of Central American art they brought back from their trip. I think this restaurant project had the most satisfying outcome. Something a designer can enjoy when dining with other new patrons.
NEW SINGLE-FAMILY RESIDENCE, CARMEL VALLEY, CA This three-story residence depicts an entirely new residential building that I primarily selected because of the degree of site difficulty. Both in the fractured limestone and the slope. It sits high on the South-facing hill overlooking Pt. Lobos State Park. The owners were from Connecticut and looking to to build their dream, retirement home. Originally, they had planned on two more bedrooms and another bathroom. I talked them out of that, which they came to appreciate later, in favor of maximizing the building quality both outside and inside within their budget. The glass-enclosed deck features an above-ground lap pool. The master bedroom suite is the upper most floor.
SCHOOL BUILDING, FRESNO, CA This is one of the more recent building designs I did. I show this primarily to show how I was still able to come up with a contemporary structure after all the years designing old-style buildings on the Peninsula. This is a private grade school and the clients were two families with a very low budget. They wanted something that satisfied their budget, yet was fun and appealing to children. So we added lots of whimsical geometric shapes and primary colors to a basic stucco box. The project had a very successful outcome.