In response to rising construction costs after World War I, Maybeck designed a generic floor plan for a studio loft space in which house and garden were to be fused into "one handsomely proportioned and beautifully furnished space." Construction materials were left unspecified, to be chosen in accordance with a particular client's desires. "The Maybeck studio on Buena Vista Way had no fine finishes. In fact it was an experimental structure, as much a laboratory as it was a house."

— Darlene Levy. drawn from Kenneth H. Cardwell. Bernard Maybeck: Artisan, Architect, Artist. p214.

The Creator's Words

"Many of his original drawings, still in existence, are too bulky to lie flat in a file; among the pages are full-scale drawings of fireplaces on folded sheets of tracing paper. These were developed on the job in cardboard, and later in plywood. Maybeck often stopped construction while a carpenter held up the boards in position; if he wasn't satisfied, he restudied the design. Maybeck practiced architecture as if it were a craft, constantly revising—in order to bring closer together the possibility and the actuality. This accounts to a large degree for his successes in blending unrelated styles."

— Esther McCoy. Five California Architects. p18.

Details

Bernard Maybeck studio
2745 Buena Vista Way, Berkeley.