This Manhattan Beach home represents the ultimate in beachfront family living. Informed by the owners’ extensive sailing experience, each of the home’s three levels embody the same efficiency of multi-purpose spaces found aboard a sailboat. Both beautiful and functional, the unique program of the Shipshape Residence allows it to exist comfortably on a small lot while still enjoying large, livable outdoor spaces within a dense urban residential context.

Enduring maritime-inspired materials like mahogany, bronze, glass, stone, steel cable and fabric fit together with nautical precision. Crisp white plaster planes emulate the uninterrupted expanse of fiberglass hulls. The entire wooden “vessel" of the upper level appears moored on top of a solid, exposed concrete base reminiscent of protective harbor jetties or engineered coastal embankments. From the moment of arrival, there is an immediate if subtle, perception of a home perfectly straddling the edge of continent and sea.