Barrel House, Pfeiffer Point Road, Big Sur, California
You've got to admire an architect who can construct a house out of two enormous redwood wine barrels and have it be one of his lesser-known projects.
Granted, it's a little hard to find. It sits on the side of a cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean at Big Sur.
It's so remote that its real estate listing starts off with directions on how to find it:
It sounded so alluring that I wanted to virtually drive down the road to the beach to find it. (I also had to because Google Maps has no idea where Pfeiffer Point Road even is.)
There aren't street signs or house numbers; just look for the barrels and you'll know you've arrived.
It was built in 1980, designed by architect Mickey (born George Kaye) Muennig (1935-2021). The barrels both have winding staircases on the sides of their living rooms:
The living rooms are connected on the first floor by the kitchen and a curved half-bathroom.
You can't beat the view from the kitchen sink:
The living room in the second barrel is a little more spacious...but it has a structural pole smack dab in its center:
It's an awesome space, but as one of his other clients noted, Muennig "failed to plan for the need of furniture."
If it were mine, I'd design some custom options to fit that custom room:
Now let's see what's upstairs:
In this barrel, the upstairs consists of a loft/office space and a full bathroom (not shown, but presumably behind one of these blue doors).
The master suite occupies the space between the two barrels:
There's a second bedroom in the second barrel.
The house has 1,940 square feet and is counted as a three bedroom property because of its one-room guesthouse.
It's very much in his style "straight lines are a cop-out" vernacular, though. It's most like his 1975 house for Sam and Shirley Prussin. (Sam was a chemist who invented Right Guard deodorant.) Their house was designed around a ten thousand gallon wine vat used a holding tank.
It collected hot water to heat the house through radiant and fan coil units with tubes to vent excess steam. He also noted that the fireplace hearth moved up and down -- if only he had rigged that carousel horse to a steam-powered hydraulic to move it up and down as well! That would have been super cool.
Barrel House also resembles another nearby Pfeiffer Beach area project...
not to mention one of his best-known works, the Coast House at Big Sur's Post Ranch Inn:
Unlike Coast House, though, Barrel House sits on five acres with a trail to access a private beach below Pfeiffer Point. It also has an outdoor bathtub.
Now that it's on the market for the first time and we've got some handwritten directions to find it, Barrel House can finally get the recognition that it deserves.
