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Dramatic view of the Grand Teton mountain range with cloud-covered peaks under a moody blue sky. A modern lodge is nestled in a vast valley of sagebrush with a winding dirt road leading to it, surrounded by distant evergreen forests.

Tengoku

Jackson, Wyoming
Service
Type
Location
  • Jackson, Wyoming
Photography
  • Matthew Millman
  • John Ellis

Injecting a dose of mid-century California modernism to the Rocky Mountain West, Tengoku embraces the natural terrain of Jackson Hole in an unexpectedly modern way. The home creates a setting the owners call Tengoku, the Japanese word for heaven.

Expansive glass walls of a modern home connect a light wood interior to a private outdoor courtyard with lush trees, rocks, and stone pathways. Beyond the courtyard, a concrete patio with minimalist seating overlooks a vast mountain landscape featuring grassy fields, a pond, and distant evergreen trees under a soft sky.

Diverging from the mountain modern style typical of the region, the design of this 4,700-square-foot vacation home was inspired by the owner couple’s shared love of Japanese Zen gardens and mid-century modern design, as well as their backgrounds living in California and Hawaii. The resulting four-bedroom home is oriented around a collection of three internal courtyards offering intimate views of single aspen trees, complementing the home’s sweeping, northwest views of the Tetons and a nearby pond.

The angular, sharply linear façade is softened by a series of guitar pick-shaped roof openings that define the three courtyards. The curvilinear openings are echoed in planters and landscape elements below. Besides shaping the light in dramatic and serendipitous ways over the course of the day, the curved openings and uninterrupted glass walls help to amplify the careful framing of nature taking place throughout the home.

Pavilions in the Landscape

Inside, an S-shaped plan snakes around the courtyards, pulling apart the public and private spaces of the home. Each resulting zone of the house feels like a small pavilion, with access to natural daylight and ventilation on multiple sides to encourage passive ventilation.

A modern, flat-roofed house with wood siding and warm interior lights, featuring two small trees growing on its roof, nestled amidst a vast landscape of dense sagebrush and native grasses under a serene blue twilight sky.
Modern interior courtyard in winter, featuring a central bare tree surrounded by snow and concrete pathways. An irregular oval opening in the wooden ceiling reveals a twilight blue sky, while warm interior lights from surrounding rooms shine through expansive glass walls.

Pops of Color

A restrained interior palette of oak floors and simple white cabinetry keeps the focus on the landscape outside, with expressive moments of art, furnishings, and finishes offering pops of color and light. A translucent amethyst stone slab is integrated into a south-facing window at the entry, while Caracas blue limestone fabricated into large format slabs clads the home’s double-sided fireplace.

Modern interior courtyard in winter, featuring a central bare tree surrounded by snow and concrete pathways. An irregular oval opening in the wooden ceiling reveals a twilight blue sky, while warm interior lights from surrounding rooms shine through expansive glass walls.
Project Leads
Contact Us
Kevin Burke AIA, LEED AP
Partner
Eric Logan FAIA
Partner
Bryan James AIA, LEED AP
Principal
Project Collaborators
Interior Design

Owner