Guides & Ideas

Concrete has a reputation for permanence. It is heavy, structural, elemental, and enduring. But in a highly resolved architectural home, concrete is rarely just poured and left to chance. It is designed, tested, coordinated, and crafted with a level of precision that homeowners may not immediately see.

For Cavin Costello, one of the biggest mistakes homeowners make is not choosing the wrong architect. It is waiting too long to speak to one. In the United States, he says, too many people begin with a builder before they have a clear architectural vision For The Ranch Mine, that can set the project on the wrong path from the start. “I think it’s a lot easier to start with an architect and interview builders than start with a builder and interview architects,” says Costello.

For McClean Design, the central ambition is not simply to create beautiful modern houses. It is to create homes that fit seamlessly into the fabric of the everyday. That idea sits at the heart of what Chris Pozil describes as the practice’s approach to “livable modernism”. The architecture may be precise, glassy, expansive and highly resolved, but it is not intended to dominate the people who inhabit it. Instead, the home should become a natural background to daily rituals, family life, entertaining, rest, wellness, and connection to place.