Project Name: Ivan Hill ADU Residence

Location: Los Angeles, California, United States

Design Team: Warren Techentin Architecture

Total Floor Area: 1,152 ft² (approximately 107 m²)

Completion: 2024

Construction: Giraffe

Photography: Courtesy of Warren Techentin Architecture

Feature: Warren Techentin Architecture's Ivan Hill ADU Residence demonstrates how fragmented massing strategies and topographic response design philosophy can transform a two-story accessory dwelling unit on a Silver Lake hillside plot into a contemporary living masterpiece of geometric dialogue and spatial flexibility.

This 1,152-square-foot residence dramatically sits upon the streetside of Ivan Hill terrace in Los Angeles's Silver Lake neighborhood, presenting itself as a profound exploration of contemporary accessory dwelling unit typology integration, material expression, and architectural volumetric strategy fusion. Through carefully considered volumetric composition and spatial organization, it creates a living experience that seamlessly weaves functionality, privacy, and panoramic vistas.

The project's most compelling design feature lies in its ingenious response and maximization of California's standard ADU size limitations. Confronting the complex conditions of hillside terrain and an existing primary residence, the architects employed a fragmentation strategy, breaking down programmatic spaces into two distinct geometric volumes, creating an architectural work that explores scale relationships and architectural autonomy. This design strategy creates sculptural qualities of architectural form, achieving a dialogic volumetric effect that allows the architecture to display its own architectural identity while respecting the scale of the existing 1,458-square-foot original residence.

Warren Techentin Architecture's design language fluently expresses contemporary California architectural vernacular, employing strategic material contrasts and staggered spatial connections to redefine accessory dwelling experiences within sloped terrain. The residence comprises two main pods: a large, shimmering reflective ocean-blue cube clad in ribbed tiles, and its counterpart, a stepped greige volume with black rectilinear window frames. The residence consists of staggered floor plates, with form following the hillside, connected by short runs of stairs linking each level of the two-story ADU.

Most remarkably, the architects create an honest material system and functional zoning through clever manipulation of the main volume and paired "topographic" volume. The main volume, housing the cubic living room and kitchen, sits askew from the paired volume hosting the bedrooms, one of which features its own kitchenette. This bold volumetric separation strategy not only creates sculptural qualities visually but cleverly accommodates the functional requirement for the ADU to accommodate two different guests or parties at once, offering privacy while sharing a communal living room.

While the exterior forms are distinctly different, the homeowners desired a simple, neutral interior with white walls and white oak flooring throughout. Color is introduced sparingly, expressed in custom millwork in blue cadet tones and various shades of aquamarine tiling in the two bathrooms. Material strategy continues this harmonious coexistence design philosophy between architecture and context, reinforcing integration with context through the use of primary materials, including the tactile texture of ribbed tiles, the transparency of glass, and the robustness of concrete.

Ample connection to the outdoors is built into the architectural design. A rooftop terrace over the greige pod and a balcony in the blue pod lend astounding views eastward toward the San Gabriel Mountains. A communal courtyard with an outdoor kitchen acts as an intermediary space between the primary residence and the ADU. Additional amenities such as a large 14-foot-tall workout apparatus, a small pool with swim jets, a dry sauna, a weightlifting pad, and a cold plunge pool enrich daily ritual and activity around the ADU.

The residence was designed for a young family of three as a secondary residence or guesthouse—a doctor, a cameraman, and their six-year-old daughter, who often host visiting family and friends. Reaching nearly the maximum allowance for standard ADUs, this Ivan Hill ADU is able to accommodate two different guests or parties at once, offering privacy while sharing a communal living room. Given the similarity in square footage between the original house at 1,458 sf and the ADU at 1,152 sf, Warren Techentin Architecture decided to fragment the ADU, breaking up the massing of the program into smaller forms to reinforce its diminutive relationship to the original.

The project strategically organizes volumes and openings to capture mountain vistas while providing natural screening through mature vegetation. The ADU doesn't stand in isolation on the site but allows itself to form a dialogic relationship with the primary residence and landscape, demonstrating Warren Techentin Architecture's commitment to site sensitivity and functional integration. This design approach reinforces the architectural transition from public street to private courtyard, creating a seamless dialogue between architecture, nature, and daily life.

Design Team: Warren Techentin Architecture stands as a distinguished representative of contemporary California architectural practice, founded by Warren Techentin, FAIA. Under the leadership of principal architect Warren Techentin and core team members Dana Lydon, Michaela Cho, Dylan Perkinson, Bryan Chen, and Can Derman, it has established a pioneering reputation in contemporary residential design, multi-family housing, and interdisciplinary design approach innovation. This Los Angeles-based practice redefines contemporary California architects' role in international design discourse through coordinated integration of design and technical precision.

Warren Techentin Architecture brings exceptional diversified design perspectives and deep understanding of emerging technology integration to architectural practice. The practice has garnered recognition for its commitment to harmoniously integrating projects with site context and client requirements, creating spatial experiences that transcend purely functional limitations. Its design methodology demonstrates sophisticated engagement with urbanism, performative infrastructures, and pop culture, believing these studies significantly influence architecture's form, space, color, sustainability, and participatory dimensions.

The firm's design philosophy emphasizes that architecture should transcend formal limitations, designed not merely to satisfy functional requirements but to organically merge with site conditions, community context, and environmental responsibility. Through deep attention to site-specific recognition and spatial continuity, working on innovative explorations of residential typologies, they believe the best architecture results from team-collaborative interventions through precise and thoughtful processes. Warren Techentin Architecture believes architecture should uncover latent site possibilities, creating atmospheric, site-specific, and surprising buildings and environments.

The firm's interdisciplinary method draws from and seeks new ways to integrate materials, construction techniques, and technology into architecture to provide freshness to form and space while simultaneously balancing immediate and future needs for energy, maintenance, and upgrades. Warren Techentin Architecture seeks connections between outside and inside—in visual, physical, and cultural terms—while also employing as primary architectural elements strategies for new methods of introducing natural ventilation and light alongside passive techniques of heating and cooling. The practice recognizes and promotes the interdependence of buildings within their expanded context and asks broader questions about their role in community life and long-term sustainability.

Principal architect Warren Techentin, born in Pasadena, California, is a licensed architect and Fellow of the American Institute of Architects. Warren's work is informed by his longstanding interest and study of urbanism, performative infrastructures, and pop culture. His design expertise includes single-family residences, multi-family housing, commercial/institutional spaces, and educational projects. Additionally, his design process seeks to integrate new technologies to create responsive environments, active and passive ventilation strategies, and sustainable systems. Warren holds a BA in Architecture from UC Berkeley, a Master of Architecture, and a Master of Architecture in Urban Design, both from Harvard University, and serves as Adjunct Associate Professor at the University of Southern California, teaching multi-family design studios, degree project design studios, graduate comprehensive design studios, and lecturing on urbanism.

Core team member Dana Lydon received her Bachelor of Architecture from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo in 2010, with a year abroad at the Danish Institute for Study Abroad in 2008-2009. She previously worked for Lorcan O'Herlihy Architects, focusing on multifamily housing projects. Dana's passion and advocacy for strong design is an important factor at every level of her work. Michaela Cho received her Master in Design Research from the Southern California Institute of Architecture and Bachelor of Architecture from the Illinois Institute of Technology, studying abroad for a year in Barcelona and developing her passion for art, culture, and urbanism. Dylan Perkinson received his Master of Architecture from the Southern California Institute of Architecture and Bachelor of Architecture from Clemson University with a minor in Fine Arts. Bryan Chen received his Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Southern California in 2021, having studied abroad throughout Asia for a semester and developing particular interest in the transient nature and focus on craftsmanship prevalent in Japanese architecture. Can Derman received his Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Southern California and has worked in architecture and design offices in Finland, France, and Turkey.

Beyond practice, through thoughtful application of material integration, new technology, passive environmental strategies, and sustainable systems, Warren Techentin Architecture has established itself as a significant contributor to contemporary California architectural discourse, creating architectural works that are both technically innovative and maintain architectural excellence. The firm has garnered significant recognition, including a 2024 Mies Crown Hall Americas Prize nomination for the Monterey Co-Living Apartments and multiple AIA honors at national, state, and local levels. Under the continued leadership of Warren Techentin and his team, the firm currently occupies a unique position within California's dynamic architectural landscape, focusing on creating spatial experiences that achieve architectural quality through material integration, spatial innovation, and contextual sensitivity.

Over the years, Warren Techentin Architecture has demonstrated remarkable versatility, with a portfolio encompassing single-family residences, multi-family housing, commercial/institutional spaces, and educational facilities. Each project reflects a commitment to craftsmanship and detail, emphasizing collaborative teamwork from project inception. Their notable works, including the Silver Lake Accessory Dwelling Unit, Monterey Co-Living Apartments, and Elysian Fields Apartments, exemplify their ability to balance contemporary architectural language with environmental responsibility, community needs, and site specificity, establishing their position as one of Los Angeles's most respected and innovative architectural practices.