This Cliff May House Was Reimagined for a Family of 6

16.08.2024 - 18:31 / sunset.com / Kristin Guy

If you’re a fan of the quintessential indoor-outdoor Western lifestyle that comes along with expansive floor-to-ceiling glass, a warm wash of natural light, breezeways that maximize airflow, and surrounding serene landscape, you can thank famed architect Cliff May. Regarded as the founding father of the iconic California ranch house, May’s work has been repeatedly published in Sunset since the 1930s. What made his work stand out at the time was how he designed homes not so much based on architecture but on the way people wanted to live in them. Making the most of the Western climate, his goal was to provide a closer relationship with nature through garden courtyards and blur the line between how we use interior and exterior spaces. May in turn created private sanctuaries where families could relax and enjoy a lifestyle of informal outdoor living. He invented the way most people want to live in the West, and his influence is felt throughout the region some 90 years later.

Thomas J. Story

When it came to revitalizing this 1936 historic Cliff May home in Coronado, California, homeowners Johnathan and Mandy McCauley knew they landed on something special. They brought on Christian Rice Architects and landscape architecture firm ORCA Living to update and reimagine the interior and exterior space in a way that a modern family could enjoy while sticking true to the original ranch home thesis. While reconfiguration and structural additions have created a modernized flow for a busy family of six, the surrounding gardens provide a remarkable case study on how vignettes and botanical moments threaded throughout an exterior space can successfully express the Cliff May vision in new, exciting ways.

Thomas J. Story

The team at design