775 San Diego Rd, Berkeley, CA 94707

At 775 San Diego Road, directly across from John Hinkel Park, the Kip House is one of the remarkable early residential works of Berkeley modernist Donald Olsen. Designed in 1952 for UC Berkeley physicist Arthur Frederic Kip, the house belongs to a formative moment in Olsen’s career, when the principles of European modernism — particularly the Bauhaus — were finding a new expression in California. Olsen embraced the Bauhaus’ emphasis on clarity, functional planning and the elimination of unnecessary ornament. An austere simplicity that feels like the way we want to live today. More than seventy years later, it is striking how modern the Kip House feels. Its clean geometry, expanses of glass and remarkably fluid plan still read as contemporary Olsen uses the slope of the site to create a sequence of subtly changing levels. The approach leads to an intermediate level containing the kitchen and dining spaces. The kitchen opens directly to the dining room — and continues outward into a...