Massive Sliding Doors Connect a Hawaii Home to Its Mountainside Settings

An off-grid getaway on O‘ahu produces all of its own electricity and opens wide to the landscape.

Jul 14, 2021 - 00:51

Massive Sliding Doors Connect a Hawaii Home to Its Mountainside Settings

An off-grid getaway on O‘ahu produces all of its own electricity and opens wide to the landscape.

O‘ahu’s North Shore is known for its epic surf, but it wasn’t the big waves that drew Sara and James Davis. It was a mountain—specifically Mount Ka‘ala, the island’s highest peak. The couple and their three children, who live an hour away in Honolulu, dreamed of a getaway in the area’s quiet interior. "We’re nature people," James explains. "We love to be out on hiking trails, mountain biking, or under the shade of mango trees."

At James and Sara Davis’s weekend home on O‘ahu, double-height doors open to a lanai-like space at the center of the house. The home’s energy needs are met via solar panels set by the entry.
Photo by Mariko Reed

The couple incorporated wood-and-glass sliding doors from ETO left over from a home they’d remodeled previously.
Photo by Mariko Reed

Here, on a 2.5-acre property shaded by100-year-old banyan trees, Sara, a doctor, and James, who works in real estate development and management, have created an off-grid family retreat where weekends are all about fresh air and living simply. They’d envisioned a modern, 600-square-foot cabin with high ceilings, a loft for the kids, and room for guests. Then, through a friend of Sara’s, they met architect Bundit Kanisthakhon, a principal at Tadpole Studio and an assistant professor at the University of Hawai‘i, who helped them realize even more.