A new house on a wine estate, built from a rough piece of land with nothing on it: a large family home, completely off the grid.

Solar, heat pumps, heating and cooling, underfloor heating, water pumps beneath the floor warmed by the solar. And all of it designed inside some of the strictest rules a site can carry: how much could be built, the distance to the road, the exact point where cars could enter, the sidelines, the privacy, with every decision passed by an incredibly strict homeowners' association.

The building became an L, to open up the garden as much as possible and turn the house towards the mountains in the distance. Outdoor spaces run along the whole ground floor, with a strip balcony following the L above them.

A separate self-contained unit sits at the front of the house with its own entrance, so guests come and go without landing in the middle of family life. Parking stays outside the garden, a pool went in, and the terracing of the levels did the quiet work of making the whole thing sit properly on the land.