This unique San Francisco home is the embodiment of Memphis style

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Italian designer and architect Ettore Sottsass designed this Memphis-style home in 2000. Contrary to the typical glass-walled contemporary look, this home features a simple, brick wall facade with an oversized awning-like structure over the front entrance.

A private courtyard is positioned at the front of the house, just off the main living room.

Custom furniture is found throughout the home, such as this piece in the living room. Sottsass's Tahiti lamp, an abstracted and geometric bird shape, was designed for the 1981 Memphis collection, and his 1969 Valentine typewriter for Olivetti is an iconic modern design.

The office boasts an 18-foot, barrel-vaulted ceiling, an architectural metaphor for inspiration and exaltation.

Images of Ettore Stottsass Memphis Style House for Sale

Several cabinets made of plastic laminate sit between between the living room and the kitchen. Passing from one area to another, guests move through them as though weaving through a forest. The pendant light is by Johanna Grawunder.

Oversized knobs feature in the bespoke kitchen. A pendant designed by Johanna Grawunder — who worked with Sottsass in Milan — hangs over the circular island. White Viking appliances are integrated with the cabinetry.

The master bedroom design places the pear wood and maple bed frame in the centre of the room. A functional shelf activates the space behind it. Glass doors open onto a patio lined in blue tile.

The master bathroom connects to the outdoors through dark, forest green tile.

The distinctions between each pavilion is most visible from a rear view, which reveals the variety of materials used, from glass to wood to brick.

A glass atrium holds together four of the six pavilions that make up the home. Sottsass considered hallways to be unimaginative, preferring to create a flexible village of connected spaces.

The home sits comfortable within the landscape, although the diverse material palette of each pavilion — stucco, shingles, brick, tile, wood, and steel — is an unconventional turn.

Current owner David M Kelley says he's hoping to find the right person to be the home's next caretaker.

The lot originally housed the equestrian facilities of a much larger then-rural estate. These structures still stand, and are at the front of the property, preserving the traditional look of the neighbourhood.

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A colourful home with a rare pedigree is looking for a new owner.

It's the embodiment of postmodern '80s design: strong geometric motifs, mixed materials often including laminate, clashing and saturated colours, and a repudiation of anything streamlined and tasteful. And it's the brainchild of Ettore Sottsass himself.

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Ettore Sottsass was a pivotal Italian architect and industrial designer in late 20th century. He's probably best-known as one of the founders of the Memphis Collective — a Milan-based group of architects and designers who took their name from a Bob Dylan song ("Stuck inside of Mobile with the Memphis blues again"). 

From 1981 until 1988, the group designed everything from buildings to ceramic to industrial products. The playful, graphic qualities of the furniture and products produced by the Memphis Group was heralded as the future of design.

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Ettore Sottsass designed most of the furniture and accessories, making this house a comprehensive showcase of Memphis design.

But the Italian-born Sottsass wasn't just an ambitious industrial designer: he was also an accomplished architect. This San Francisco-area home is one of only three homes Sottsass designed in the States, and it is a truly unique dwelling. The 4-bedroom house is composed of five distinctive pavilions, linked by an atrium.



Sottsass built the 640-square-metre home for his close friend, David M Kelley, an American entrepreneur, designer and teacher. No stranger to iconic design himself, Kelley's company, Ideo, created many notable tech gadgets, including the first mouse for Apple computers.

Each of the pavilions has a distinct function: living and dining area, kitchen, office, master suite and children's bedrooms. Additionally, each one has a shape, material and colour. A green geometric house-shape modeled after the Monopoly piece holds the children's rooms, and a shingled Quonset hut gives a 5.5 metre arched ceiling to the office space.

In an interview with Surface magazine last year, Kelley explained the unusual windowless front facade of the home: "Sottsass hated American houses that had the garage in front. He hated any kind of house that was showing off or saying, 'Look at me! Look how precious and important I am!' My house is absolutely plain on the front — it's a brick wall with an awning. Ettore's point was to say, 'You're welcome here—but it's a private house.' I think Ettore got this idea from Milan; when you're walking down the street, there are all these nondescript wood doors, and you can't tell what's behind them."

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In the early 21st century, the colourful exuberence and joyful wackiness of 1980's Memphis style can seem a bit kitschy. Even in its heyday, it wasn't a style that everyone embraced.


The house generates lively commentary on many design-based websites. One commentator on San Francisco-based SocketSite opined, "That this place gets its fair share of haters is not too surprising. Every brash new wave of design hits its nadir about two to four decades after its introduction because it looks so 'dated'. Even San Fran's cherished Victorian homes were despised for many years around WWII before being rediscovered."

Another agreed, "This home is full on Sottsass (and Memphis) in colour and material and shape mix. Those vases and table lamps and cabinets and credenza and media centre and divider headboards are all, I think, his design. Even the Emeco aluminium chairs in the dining room and the office swivels are Sottsass versions.

"This house is very much of a time and I agree that it will age better than it looks now. It's like living in a sculpture (not one I'd want to live in – but one I'd like to have a cocktail in or visit)."

The house is now on the market for $20.5 million. When asked why he was selling, Kelley explained, "I'm 65. The prospect of leaving the house saddens me, but it is on a big piece of property, and it's a lot to maintain. Sottsass is not the kind of world-famous architect that every Gen-X wonder kid who works at Google wants to have, so passing it to the right person will be important for me."

 - Homed

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