Mariani Lodge, Rebuilding in Yolo County: Project Profile

The Mariani’s Napa County home was one of thousands destroyed in the early morning hours of Oct 9, 2017, as the Atlas Fire consumed +50,000 acres. Once the fires were contained, they looked at the charred remains of their family home and decided to rebuild on a farm they owned in Yolo County in order to be closer to family.

They worked with Brendan Kelly, Amie MacPhee, and Kerry Morgan of Cultivate Studio, an Architecture and Landscape practice with offices in San Francisco and Green Valley, to come up with a site plan and the first structures. Together, they transformed this site bordering Putah Creek into a welcoming and functional place for multiple generations. The Lodge structure is meant to recall the simple agricultural form of a barn that allows for large scale entertainment while providing a lot of shade and cross ventilation during hot summer days. The roof is standing seam metal, the siding is board and batten, and the floors are bluestone.

In rethinking their lives after such a devastating loss, the Mariani’s went back to “first principles” instead of just trying to rebuild a home that was meant for an earlier time in their lives. Since they now are able to spend more time traveling the most important part of rebuilding was to provide a place in which to to return that could fit their large family and recall their long tradition of living in and around working agricultural landscapes. With bedrooms and other private spaces being handled elsewhere on the property, this building is already hosting bbqs and relaxing pool parties. Scheduled to be complete in late September, it’s already starting to feel like home.

Construction started in February with Tim Senior General Contractors and Mozzafari Engineering handling the Structural design. Cultivate LLC performed all the site planning, architecture, and landscape duties.