Pacific Heights
Location: Bend, OR
Project Partners
Architect/Builder: PacWest Builders
Landscape Contractor: Mountain Sky
Photography:
Cheryl McIntosh
Ross Chandler
We approached this project as an opportunity to create a landscape that feels inseparable from its Central Oregon setting while amplifying the relationship between the main house, the guest/pool house, and the long mountain views that originally drew the client to the site.
From the outset, our role was to respond to the existing topography, rock outcroppings, and panoramic views so that the house and guest/pool house feel set into the land rather than imposed upon it. We oriented outdoor rooms, circulation, and key view corridors to preserve and frame Central Oregon’s iconic peaks, using the architecture as an anchor for a landscape that reads as both refined near the buildings and increasingly natural as you move out into the site.
Between the main house and the pool/guest house, we organized a formal lawn as the central green “room” where the family’s daughters can play and where both buildings visually and physically engage the landscape at a shared elevation. This generous, level plane resolves complex grade changes between the two structures, allowing for seamless indoor–outdoor transitions from the main living spaces, across the terraces, and out to the pool and lawn without the experience feeling engineered or forced.
To connect the upper terrace at the main house to the lower lawn, pond, and firepit areas, we designed meandering stone stairs that become a sculpted walk through the site rather than a simple grade solution. Along this path, we composed a cascading water feature that threads through the stairs and existing topography, adding sound, movement, and a cooling presence that contrasts the otherwise dry high-desert climate and visually leads the eye down toward the pond and fire feature.
Throughout the property, including the tennis court, lower lawn, and water feature, we worked with existing grades and natural features wherever possible, holding to the belief that it is always better to preserve than to restore. By reading the land carefully and minimizing disturbance to native vegetation and rock, we were able to integrate new walls, courts, and terraces so the entire composition feels anchored in its natural setting.
Because the site is on well water, we designed a highly efficient irrigation system using subsurface drip, weather-based controls, and high-efficiency spray heads. This approach supports the more manicured zones around the house and guest house while allowing outer planting areas to transition to primarily high-desert natives after establishment. At the heart of the space between the structures, we selected synthetic turf for the formal lawn to reduce water use and maintenance, accepting its seasonal visual contrast as a deliberate, high-impact green core that delivers the durability and play value the family wanted from their personal resort.
Consistent with our broader approach, the landscape is most structured immediately around the main house, pool terrace, and guest house, then gradually relaxes into a more natural palette and form language as one moves outward. This layered transition, from crisp terraces, stairs, and formal lawn to looser native plantings and preserved rock, allows the architecture to sit confidently in a cultivated foreground while the overall property still feels deeply connected to the Central Oregon landscape.
