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"View Slideshow\n\nBuilding a house is rarely, if ever, a painless undertaking, but some residential projects seem to come together with just a little less Sturm und Drang than others. Consider the experience of Dick and Sue Wollack. Dick Wollack develops vineyards in California and the Pacific Northwest, and several years ago the couple decided they wanted to relocate from their San Francisco neighborhood of Presidio Heights to Napa Valley, where they own two wineries. They purchased property outside the picturesque town of St. Helena and began making plans to build a farmhouse on it.\n\n\u201CWe were at a wedding in Napa on a Saturday, and I mentioned our ideas to someone who said, \u2018There\u2019s this architect you ought to take a look at, named Howard Backen,\u2019 \u201D recounts Dick Wollack. \u201CSo then on Sunday morning I\u2019m visiting another friend in Oakville, and driving up, I see next door to his entrance a sign that says Backen. My friend called Howard up, and Howard said, \u2018How would you like to come over and see my house?\u2019 He was just finishing his own house. And guess what? It was a farmhouse [see Architectural Digest, September 2004]. It was just so beautiful and open and so much our aesthetic that I called Sue on the way home and said, \u2018I found him.\u2019 If you want a real story, though, Howard designed a Greek restaurant in San Francisco called Kokkari, and years before, when we first went there, Sue said, \u2018I want my house to look like this.\u2019 \u201D\n\nGiven that auspicious beginning, a curveball or two was probably inevitable. Howard J. Backen (of Backen Gillam Architects in St. Helena) spent a year working on the plans for a modest but airy rural-flavored house that could function just as well for the couple alone as for large gatherings of friends and family.\n\nIn the meantime, the Wollacks bought another property nearby to live in during construction\u2014a small yellow 1890s farmhouse on a single acre within walking distance of St. Helena\u2019s historic Main Street. \u201CThen Howard came and saw the place,\u201D reports Sue Wollack. \u201CHe said, \u2018You know, this could really be neat.\u2019 \u201D\n\nOut with the new, in with the old.\n\n\u201CThe house was very small and not in great shape, but it had a nice feeling and nice proportions,\u201D explains Backen. \u201CThe Wollacks just wanted a one-bedroom house with a guesthouse, so my idea was to hold the scale of the farmhouse and its front porch\u2014not go up a story or glom on a huge master bedroom\u2014but have a glass connector run to a master suite, so it\u2019s sort of like a compound. The third element is the guesthouse, which forms a courtyard around an old oak tree.\u201D The majestic 400-year-old oak is now ringed by a brick terrace that defines the central gathering space between the farmhouse and the two added structures. \u201CThat big oak is a very important element,\u201D says Backen. \u201CWe spent a lot of time making sure it was healthy.\u201D\n\nAnd the terrace is only one of a sequence of outdoor spaces\u2014a border garden between the farmhouse and the master suite, a swimming pool patio behind the farmhouse, rose gardens behind the master suite\u2014that Backen, landscape designer Claudia Schmidt and project manager Edmund Juncker created to fashion \u201Ca house sitting within the landscape with large-scale openings that pull the landscape into the house and vice versa.\u201D\n\nIn addition to the new master (which has its own gym and \u201Cbath garden\u201D) and one-bedroom guesthouse, the Wollacks enjoy the use of a spacious kitchen and dining area at the rear of the rebuilt farmhouse. It has a screen porch that overlooks the pool area and is echoed by a porch off the master suite commanding a view of the surrounding foothills. Wide openings, screen porches and pocket doors are Backen trademarks, and they were critical elements in establishing the sense of space the couple sought within a relatively small building footprint. \u201CThe house keeps unfolding and opening up,\u201D notes Dick Wollack. \u201CIt has\u2014Howard taught us the word\u2014cadence.\u201D\n\nThe three buildings employ the same classic farmhouse vocabulary\u2014cedar siding, French windows and brick pavers outside; reclaimed-fir floors, white-painted ceiling beams and trusses, and cozy fireplaces inside. Rustic antiques, contemporary paintings and DeSimone pottery\u2014all of which the couple have collected for years\u2014tie together the interiors of this versatile compound.\n\n\u201CThe Wollacks had a strong program in the sense of how they wanted to live,\u201D explains Backen. \u201CThey didn\u2019t want it to come out looking big or being big. They wanted to maintain the character of being small.\u201D\n\nThe couple recently hosted their daughter\u2019s wedding at the house. Some 200 guests were invited, and all indications are that the event went off without a hitch. \u201CWe had a couple of big parties right when we moved in,\u201D Sue Wollack noted shortly before the wedding. \u201CIt was summer, it was still warm, and when you opened up the doors on the big porch and on the porch of our bedroom\u2014again this idea of balance and cadence\u2014and you had all the lights on and all these people outdoors, it was magnificent.\u201D\n\nAnd that\u2019s the point, says Backen. \u201CA hundred people leave, and it feels like it\u2019s built for two.\u201D"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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