Property of Mr. and Mrs. George Goddard, Belvedere, California | Architect: George Goddard

Hardy materials are essential in a house built for a young family with energetic growing children. But hardiness need not mean drabness, as architect George Goddard has demonstrated by the house he built for his own family in Belvedere, Calif. Concrete was his choice for both indoors and outdoors, and it has proved a good one. Concrete block walls and concrete paving have stood up well to the daily wear and tear of a small army of young Goddards-five boys, ranging downwards from 9 years to 2, and a baby girl. The material also turned out to be economical, an important asset for a house of 2.980 square feet. And the concrete blocks adapted easily to the curving walls which were a vital part of the architect's design.

The Goddard house stands on a pie-shaped corner lot bounded by two busy streets. From the street corner all you can see are two windowless curves of concrete wall. The nearest curve appears to be the wall of a drive-through carport, which, in fact, it is. But you might not guess that two-thirds of the curve is also the entry wall of the house and the rest is merely a projection to screen one wing from the street. The other wing is screened by the second curve of wall, only one end of which is anchored to the house itself. In the space between the curves where they overlap, is the main entrance. Within the house are two more curved walls that mark off the main living area from the parents' private wing on the one side and from the five- bedroom children's wing on the other. All these curves would have been complex and costly to build in wood framing. But concrete block can be laid in a curve without framework, bound firmly together with wedge-shaped mortar joints and metal reinforcing rods.

The back of the house faces south toward a lagoon, and the glass walls of the living, dining and family rooms in the center of the plan all open wide to a concrete paved terrace overlooking the water. The kitchen, an oval room which is literally a control tower in the very center of the plan, also shares the view. From both sides of this well engineered work center, ceiling-high tambour walls of ash slide out on floor and ceiling tracks to close off the kitchen-dining area from the living room on one side and the family room on the other. The family room doubles conveniently as the children's playroom since it is adjacent to their bedrooms and play yard and also to the laundry which has an outside door and serves as a mud room.

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source: House and Garden Magazine | July 1960