How this award-winning architect strikingly captures the spirit of North County in all of his projects — from Cardiff-by-the-Sea to Carlsbad

“This is my first home that I’ve designed and lived in, so it’s nice to finally have arrived at that moment,” says architect Brett Farrow.

We’re here at SEA4 on San Elijo. The four residences are terraced against the hill, outstretched gracefully toward the ocean. Stopping traffic. 

As with all of Farrow’s North County projects, there’s an exploration of light, privacy, and sustainability with purpose-driven materials. Cast-in-place concrete quiets the interiors. Aluminum staves off salt corrosion. Western red cedar, which is resilient to termites, is warmed with patina from the Cardiff sun. 

Most meaningfully, every home at SEA4 was designed to maximize ocean views with Farrow jigsawing them into different arrangements until the perfect configuration emerged. Inside, each home retains individual characteristics and surprise connections to nature. 

“Light is one of my building materials,” says Farrow, who taught architecture at Woodbury University and NewSchool of Architecture & Design for 14 years. 

Twenty years ago, the architect and developer decamped Little Italy’s burgeoning design scene for North County. At the time, colleagues like Jonathan Segal and Mike Burnett were transforming odd-shaped lots in South Park and Golden Hill with cool infill projects. They balked at Farrow’s move. That was then.  

“North County was always seen as a little bit more provincial. I was worried about how modern architecture would be accepted up here. But I also wanted to get back to the beach, and I grew up surfing,” says Farrow, who with his wife, Heidi, raised his two daughters here and became very much rooted in the community. 

In the decades since, Farrow carved out a recognizable oeuvre while cementing the value of his modern, textured architecture. In Encinitas, he erected the concrete-and-glass C3 bank on Coast Highway that reflects a true North County sense of place. Cast-in-place white concrete recalls the nearby coastal bluffs while a second-story glass perch nods to lifeguard towers. 

“I wanted the bank to feel both solid and yet transparent with concrete and glass,” says Farrow. 

The multi-use building, also home to private offices, features a densely planted atrium with bamboo. It serves as a shady respite while creating a white-noise sanctuary from the 101 bustle. 

In Carlsbad, his chiseled Laguna Row on Buena Vista Lagoon brought global accolades from Dezeen, which named it one of the Top 10 architectural projects in 2022 for reshaping suburban American design. The site, a former medical building, ticked all of Farrow’s boxes: already developed, urban, and nature-adjacent. 

“When I was first looking at buying the site it felt like discovering a secret place,” says Farrow. “The golden reeds were swaying in the breeze, and it felt like Central California to me.  Although there I was — on the edge of a downtown in over-developed Southern California.”

For Laguna Row, 13 slender, cedar-clad detached houses were angled toward the lagoon, inspired by the restraint and materiality of Sea Ranch in Mendocino County. While the buildings all share the same design vocabulary, Farrow cleverly integrated five different floor plans while artfully carving out surprise window patterns. Once inside, the full impact of the topography is dramatically revealed.  

 “Sea Ranch is one of the most influential projects and a real touchstone for my design ideas,” says Farrow.  “I was already using a lot of cedar siding so it made sense. Cedar is beautiful when it’s brand new, but I really wanted it to have this patina, and show that it’s been there a while.” 

Beyond Carlsbad or Encinitas, it’s 92007 where Farrow is most fluent. (Current number of projects underway here: Six.) His early Mozart project was pivotal in shaping his career as architect and developer while creating demand for commissioned projects. On Mozart, he honed his vernacular in materials, sustainability, and flow.  

“The Mozart project allowed me to work through some ideas about what it means to build in coastal Southern California,” says Farrow. 

In 2010, he acquired the property on Mozart Avenue across from Cardiff Elementary featuring a 1912 Craftsman. He restored the original house and raised his family here while methodically developing six row houses on the plot around him. 

Not just any row houses. Thirteen years later, these residences reflect the value of Farrow’s architecture. Last year, one of the homes sold over ask, with multiple buyers vying for the light-filled three-bedroom home with an ocean-view roof deck. 

On a personal level, while his colleagues remained in San Diego metro, Farrow was strengthening his North County community ties. He and Heidi raised their two daughters here alongside family pets that included dogs, a cat, and at one point, a chicken that laid blue eggs. 

“Being in Cardiff and really setting down roots here, it’s important what happens around me to help guide that policy and process,” says Farrow. “Architects should be an advocate and not just a victim of guidelines. And so I’ve been an advocate here,  pushing the boundaries in design. I feel like I’ve arrived at something that works for where we are and reflects our time and place.”

Back at SEA4, Farrow is at home, shoes off. The office commute: It’s down the stairs. Located on the first level with a separate entrance, the office is a place for blueprints and surfboards. How many times did he get in the water this week? “Four.” Farrow prefers to walk everywhere — to surf, to Seaside Market for breakfast burritos, to the post office. 

“There’s only a few places in North County where you get this great presence on the ocean. This one of them,“ says Farrow from his balcony, where he checks the surf for seven (!) nearby breaks. “With SEA4, we like to say that, finally, the cobbler’s children have shoes.”