My client has moved into an exquisite property in the Coto De Caza estates adjacent to Rancho Santa Margarita in Orange County, CA. Their new home has a 5000 sq ft home, a 1000 sq ft pool house, and a 1200 sq ft horse barn with a classic wood saloon complete with swinging cowboy doors. They have plans to do a complete overhaul on the barn, so I've designed a barn expansion for them which will almost double the size, but I'll cover that design in an upcoming blog post.
On their property they have a vinyard with 285 infant grape vines (80% cabernet, 10% merlot, 10% malbec), and below their house they have a wine cellar which holds approx 2200 bottles and a front room that is rigged for making and fermenting wine. There are cabinets next to a large wood/iron wine press adjacent to a couple sinks for the wine making process ... but there is no good place to sit and enjoy the wine. Being major wine connoisseurs, my client wants to install some type of seating for tasting wine and entertaining guests in this unique wine room. Here is a photo of the space (the sink is to the right and the wine press and cabinets are behind the camera):
The design problem was that they wanted seating, but also needed storage for all sorts of stuff (wine glasses, fermentation equipment, bottling equipment, etc). After presenting a couple furniture ideas, the client quickly shot down the ideas noting that it needs to be more "built-in". Like a bench that doubles as cabinets ...
