Lake Tahoe Truckee | Residential Design · Land Use Planning · Permit Plans
BASQUE HOUSE
BASQUE HOUSE
Northstar Truckee California
GARAGE ADDITION
GUEST-SUITES ADDITION
ENTRY / MUDROOM ADDITION
PRIMARY EN-SUITE ADDITION
DINING ROOM ADDITION
3900+ SF
6 BR
4 BA
2 CAR GARAGE
Project Team
Designer:
MASTRIDICASA
Contractor:
CMJR Construction Inc
Structural Engineer:
Shear Force Engineering
Photography:
Dave Donnelly
A family legacy home expanded for the way the next chapter needed to work.
Set within Northstar-at-Tahoe, the house had served the family for years and carried a character worth preserving. What it no longer had was enough room, a practical winter arrival, protected parking, or the capacity to comfortably support a growing mix of family and guests.
The project added a new dining room, primary en-suite, two-car garage, interior entry connection and mudroom, additional bedrooms, a bunkroom guest suite, and a more useful outdoor gathering area.
Fitting all of that onto the property was the challenge. The existing house occupied the site tightly, while setbacks, coverage limits, existing nonconforming conditions, structural requirements, design review, budget, and construction access left little room for an obvious solution.
After studying several approaches, the work found its way forward: expand the home substantially, give it a proper arrival sequence, improve how it moves through the seasons, and let the new construction feel like a natural continuation of what the family already valued.
The result is a more capable mountain home — easier to arrive at, more generous when family gathers, and still unmistakably the house that has belonged to them all along.
EXISTING CONDITIONS
The original home had good bones, a strong identity, and a long history with the family.
What it did not have was an easy way in.
Arrival began at a small street-level parking area, followed by a narrow, steep walk up to the house. In a Northstar winter, groceries, luggage, ski gear, guests, and everyday life all had to negotiate the same difficult path.
The family needed an attached garage, interior connection, proper entry sequence, mudroom, additional bedrooms, guest space, and better places to gather.
Finding room for all of that without overwhelming the existing house became the central problem.
The project needed more space. Just as importantly, it needed to make coming home easier.
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APPROVED DESIGN
This was not a simple addition.
The existing house sat tightly on the parcel, leaving setbacks, coverage limits, existing nonconforming conditions, structural constraints, access, budget, and Northstar design guidelines all competing for the same limited room.
Multiple schemes were studied before arriving at a solution that met the family’s priorities and received approval from the Northstar Property Owners Association Design Review Committee.
The approved plan reorganized far more than square footage. It changed how the house receives people, stores gear, accommodates guests, gathers as a family, and connects to the outdoors.
The new work extends the forms, proportions, and warm mountain character of the existing house without simply copying it. Rooflines, wood siding, openings, and exterior relationships were developed so the additions would read as part of one composition rather than a collection of pieces added over time.
The challenge was expansion. The design opportunity was making the entire house work better because of it.
CONSTRUCTION BEGINS
Construction began after a long winter and delayed snowmelt compressed the available building season.
Before the additions could rise, the site needed substantial work of its own. A twelve-foot retaining wall and driveway bridge became critical pieces of the new arrival sequence, influencing grading, structure, access, and the placement of the garage and surrounding improvements.
It was not the glamorous part of the project. It was the work that made everything else possible.
The work below and around the house made the easier arrival, protected parking, and expanded home possible.
The new foyer gives the house something it had never really had: a proper place to arrive.
Rather than stepping directly from winter weather into the living areas, the family now has a protected transition for boots, coats, groceries, gear, and guests before moving farther into the house.
The room itself is modest.
Its effect on daily life is not.
A few carefully placed square feet turned arrival from something the family had to negotiate into an easy part of coming home.
GARAGE + ARRIVAL
The garage addition changed the relationship between the house and the street.
Enclosed parking, storage, weather protection, mudroom function, and direct interior access now work as one sequence rather than a series of compromises.
In a mountain home, that kind of arrival is more than convenience. Snow, ice, wet gear, groceries, luggage, and cold weather are part of everyday life for a good portion of the year.
The new connection lets the house meet those realities gracefully instead of asking the family to work around them.
The new patio establishes an outdoor gathering area at the center of the expanded home.
Connected directly to the new living spaces, it gives family and guests a natural place to move outside for meals, conversation, and quieter time among the trees.
Its importance is less about the patio itself than the relationship it creates between the new interior spaces and the landscape immediately beyond them.
The expanded house gained more room inside — and a better reason to step outside.
OUTDOOR GATHERING
Connected to the expanded living areas, the rear patio gives family and guests a natural place to move outside for meals, conversation, and quieter time among the trees.
Its importance is less about the patio itself than the relationship it creates between the new interior spaces and the landscape immediately beyond them.
VIEW FROM THE GOLF COURSE
From the golf course, the central design question becomes visible.
A substantial amount of new construction was added, but the house still needed to read as one composition rather than an original building with several additions attached to it.
Roof forms, proportions, exterior relationships, and the placement of the new work were developed to preserve that continuity. Warm wood siding, deep overhangs, and the established mountain vocabulary of the original house carry through the additions while allowing the new pieces to serve their own purposes.
The objective was not to disguise the fact that the house had grown.
It was to make the growth feel coherent.
The home is substantially larger and more capable, yet from the landscape it still reads as the same house — simply given the room it needed.
PRIMARY SUITE WITH REVISED SCREENED DECK
More privacy, more comfort, and a better relationship to the outdoors.
The primary suite addition gives the Basque House a more private retreat within what had become a larger and more active family home.
The revised screened deck adds another layer of usefulness: protected outdoor space that can be enjoyed without feeling exposed to neighboring activity or the weather. It gives the suite a quieter connection to the mountain setting while preserving its separation from the more social parts of the house.
This part of the project was about balance: privacy without isolation, connection without exposure, and new comfort without losing the character of the original home.
The family gained a place to retreat without ever feeling removed from the house — or the landscape — around them.
