College Hill HUB and Canopy
Eugene, Oregon
A College Hill family needed more indoor and outdoor space to expand during Covid. Their backyard was steeply sloped and mostly inaccessible. Working in tandem with Lovinger Robertson Landscape Architects as they resolved grading challenges through retaining walls and terraced landscaping, Rowell Brokaw converted an old woodshop into a HUB (center of activity) and designed a garden canopy.
The former woodshop was envisioned as the family HUB with a strong indoor-outdoor connection. Large windows and sliding glass doors open onto the patio and landscape. A Juliet balcony on the east wall overlooks a grass lawn and the garden canopy. The interior features an L-shaped, open kitchen, dining, and living room with high 11 ft ceilings. In a nod to the former woodshop, the floors are finished with OSB. The HUB is the perfect space for the owners to escape with or without their small kids and to have grandparents come for a short stay.
Attached to the main house at the bottom of the slope, the garden canopy offers views of the landscaping and HUB. Beneath a warm wood soffit and sleek steel structure, family and friends can relax by the outdoor gas fireplace, play games, cook, and dine outside. Materials used in the canopy and landscaping include Port Orford cedar, steel, bamboo decking, finished concrete, Cor-Ten, and shou sugi ban (burned cedar) fencing. Like the landscape it compliments, this covered outdoor space is layered, open, and dynamic. Three, dome-shaped skylights offer additional light to the 600-sf canopy, as well as sheltered views of the rain.
