[music playing]
Hey, come with me.
I think something that has been a dream of mine
since I was a young kid was to be able to walk out my door
and go right on a trail and be able to hike and run.
NORA ROSENTHAL: Coming to Sea Ranch
is just a time to slow down.
You can enjoy kids.
You can let them just do very simple things.
They're just like sitting, looking, observing.
Bye, deer.
NORA ROSENTHAL: From the ocean and the trees
and animals and wildlife.
It's just like the simplest way to be.
It's like we pull up and you just
give this big sigh of relief.
We're in the Sea Ranch.
We're in Northern California.
It's about 2.5 hours north of San Francisco Bay Area.
NATE ROSENTHAL: We're on the rugged California Coast.
You really feel the nature, where the trees are windswept.
NORA ROSENTHAL: Rosea Ranch is situated
at the end of a cul-de-sac.
We were looking for a place that we could kind of make
a second home to be able to vacation
and get out of the busy city life.
NATE ROSENTHAL: As you arrive and walk into the home,
you have the dining room and living
room that are open to each other,
and then the kitchen that's right around the corner.
To your right, you have the sleeping quarters, with three
bedrooms and two bathrooms.
And then you have a staircase that
goes up to a little loft area.
One of the things that really sold us on this home
was when you walk in, feeling like it's
almost an extension of nature.
The way that the windows have been designed, the sight lines,
put the entire environment on display for us.
You really don't feel like there's anybody else here.
It's just you in this house with nature.
It's stadium seating for the main event, which is really
the ocean and the environment, many different types
of wildlife.
You know, Sea Ranch is one of the first really
purposefully designed to-be-one-with-nature
communities that existed.
There's about 2,000 lots with about 400 full-time residents.
Sea Ranch was founded in the '60s, with really an intention
to build with the land, not on top of the land, but to really
think about the land.
Think about the individual site that the home sits on,
and then to design the architecture such
that the built environment and the natural environment
are really one, so that we can slow things down,
so that we can live lightly on the land.
And then we can really just enjoy nature
kind of as it was intended.
NORA ROSENTHAL: You know, you only
have a certain amount of space for your home and your yard.
And then everything else that you see around us
is common shared space.
So as an owner, you are part owner of all of the shared
space around the Sea Ranch.
The Douglas fir and the Redwood are native to this area.
And the wood that's used both in the fences and the house
and the exterior, the interior, traditionally
were all from right here, right around the Sea Ranch.
You see those shades of red, those browns.
NORA ROSENTHAL: The wood--
like, everything just kind of ages and wears as it should.
It's saltwater.
It's wind.
It's rain.
It's fog.
It's like every element that you can throw at it.
And yet, it just wears in this way that is so beautiful.
The home was built in 1978.
We tried to keep as much of the original feel of the home
intact, to keep the home feeling as it was meant to feel back
in the late '70s, trying to preserve
the memory and keep being great stewards of the home,
of the land.
A lot of things just needed some updating.
NATE ROSENTHAL: Whether it's by adding solar and battery power
to continue to live even more lightly off the land,
or slightly modernizing or at least refreshing
some of the appliances and furniture.
With all of the wood walls and the wood floors with ceilings,
like everything is this natural color.
I wanted to find a way to bring, you
know, some of the blues and greens
of our natural environment outside inside as well,
with our artwork and our plants and colors that we chose.
Bright pops of yellow, red, orange.
Coming into the kitchen.
The home is fully electric.
So all the appliances are electric.
The heaters are electric.
We have solar on the roof.
And so for the majority of the year,
the home operates off the grid from an electricity standpoint.
We have batteries that power all of our appliances.
So there's no gas in the home at all.
All right.
Here we are.
We're in our guest bedroom.
When we were thinking about the design of this room,
we just wanted it to be very cozy.
We found this very large weaving that we thought was just kind
of ideal colors for the room and just added a little bit
of texture to all the wood.
I really love that it kind of fills up this space.
There is a very special part of this room.
You have to climb a very treacherous ladder to get to it.
It's one of our kids' favorite spots to hide out.
And it's just big enough for, like, a queen-sized mattress.
The original owners designed the home, built the home,
for their family.
And they had young, young children.
NATE ROSENTHAL: It was a home that really
was built for this purpose.
And I think that was meaningful to us.
We can always come back to this kind
of slow down, simpler pace.
I think it's really important to keep us grounded
and not as busy.
So, yeah.
Welcome to the primary bedroom.
We have a window that goes all the way up to the ceiling.
So you can be lying in bed and looking up at the stars
at the same time.
It's pretty magical.
This room really serves two purposes.
It's obviously a bedroom.
But it's great to just sit right in this chair,
look out at the ocean, and just listen.
It's a great room for that, for relaxing,
for enjoying music, books.
Just relaxing and staring off into the distance.
All right.
So we're heading upstairs to our library and our kids' room
as well.
This is a room that is full of books and puzzles and games,
and a little swing that was left behind,
too, from our previous owners that we love.
All right.
Not too fast, though.
The cherry on top was when we took
that walk for the first time down the path to the beach
and realized our backyard was a massive sandy beach with access
to this amazing coast.
The kids get so much energy from nature.
That's one of the things that was so exciting about Sea Ranch
to us is giving the kids that exposure and that opportunity
that you don't get necessarily, like, in the city in Oakland.
Our kids are almost 9 and 6 that they can do a lot more.
And we can do a lot more as a family together, like exploring.
You know, last time we were here, I think this was off then.
We met when we were living in Chicago.
I think we always were interested in going West.
Once we got out here, we also thought like, well, we'll just
do it for a couple of years and we'll see if it fits
and if we like it.
It just seemed like California had it all.
Coming out here and seeing seals
and whales and all sorts of bird life is just-- it's incredible.
You have the time to be with family
and do kind of the simpler things.
It's going outside.
It's walking.
It's exploring things.
It's discovering.
You know, you're just constantly inspired by the surroundings.
We feel incredibly lucky to be able to spend time here.
Like, every time we arrive, I have a sense of peace
and feeling so grateful.