The Sea Ranch in Sonoma County, California is an architectural icon drawing its identity from the landscape. So successful is this image of topography, buildings, and plants in harmony that the residents—through the agency of The Sea Ranch Design Review Board—must vigilantly protect it from change, paradoxically, even when that change is coming from the landscape itself. While The Sea Ranch prides itself on its incorporation of indigenous vegetation, its Design Review Board strategically cultivates a carefully manicured vision of the rural landscape. No doubt the encroachment of coastal forest presents a fire risk, but more than that it threatens to change The Sea Ranch’s renowned image of buildings set in meadows with picturesque patches of vegetation serving as backdrop.
As with most instances of cultural landscape, rather than understanding the underlying motivations of the development at hand—in this instance an eco-community—the appearance is strictly controlled and enforced: through The Sea Ranch’s Declaration of Restrictions, Covenants, and Conditions that regulates all building and landscape activity, the Design Review Board and its allied Design Committee restricts and directs massing, footprints, heights, materials, colors, paths, plantings, and uses for both the architecture and the landscape. All utilities are hidden underground, cars and trash enclosures are lined in redwood, the 500,000-gallon water reservoir and treatment plant is located away from the development and painted green, exterior surfaces are color-regulated, reflective materials and exterior lighting are not permitted, and colorful curtains are out of the question.1 While such regulations prevent the area being overrun by generic suburban construction, they concurrently promote an artificial version of the natural, unable to move beyond its own legacy, propping up an image of The Sea Ranch as a wild landscape that in reality is defined by restrictions and hidden infrastructure.
LA+ Identity Issue