Set within the Pacific Northwest, the A-Frame Workshop is a garage and workspace defined by steel, glass, and a restrained industrial language. Designed as a detached extension of the home, it balances mechanical utility with architectural clarity, creating a space where cars, tools, and daily use coexist naturally.
ARCHITECTURE
A-Frame Workshop: Industrial Form in a Forest Setting
Project Details:
Architect: Kilburn Architects
Location: Issaquah, WA | Renovated 2018
Photographer: Darren Fleming
Set back among the trees in Washington State, the A-Frame Workshop is a garage defined as much by its architecture as by the machines it holds, a theme we’ve explored across other Carchitecture features on Garage Recess. Clad in steel and glass, the structure sits apart from the main residence while maintaining a shared material language, positioning the garage not as an accessory, but as an extension of the broader design. It’s a space built for use, equal parts workshop and environment, where automotive work and daily life overlap without separation.
Architectural Intent
The property, dating to 1965, possesses a history that deviates from the ordinary. Prior to its recent transformation, local lore recounts a previous owner maintaining an African lion on the grounds, an improbable detail that nonetheless aligns with the property's enduring appeal to those drawn to the unconventional. Today, it belongs to an individual with a similar inclination for the distinct.
A History of Unconventionality
The owner’s automotive journey began in Southern California before evolving through two decades in Arizona. Cars entered his life early. At fourteen, he acquired his first vehicle for $600: a 1976 GMC Jimmy. It became a classroom. By sixteen, he had rebuilt and sold it, moving through a succession of Mustangs, Camaros, and whatever else he could find on farms and back roads. Fix, learn, sell. Repeat. That set the foundation.
It’s a pattern that shows up often across the garages we’ve documented, including places like Werkstatt 80, where learning to work on cars at a young age becomes less a phase and more a lifelong pursuit.
A Collector's Trajectory
That instinct never left. The owner estimates having owned well over a hundred cars, including more than thirty Porsches in the last decade alone. At the center of the current collection sits a 1994 964 factory Turbo. Wide-bodied, re-engineered, and deeply personal. Converted from all-wheel drive to rear-wheel drive and paired with a 3.8-liter engine and six-speed transmission, it’s less a showpiece than a culmination shaped through use.
That same mindset of curiosity, refinement, and a respect for engineering history, runs through the entire property, echoing ideas seen in projects like The Garage House, where architecture and automotive life are considered together from the outset.
The Refined Residence
The home underwent a comprehensive architectural overhaul in 2018, one that embraced the constraints of the A-frame rather than softening them. Straight walls are rare. The design leans into volume and natural light instead.
A glass spine traces the peak of the roof, pulling daylight deep into the interior. Skylights ensure the space remains bright even on overcast Pacific Northwest days. Walnut cabinetry and warm finishes temper the industrial shell, a similar balance also seen in projects like MCM Moto Mecca, where a serious working environment is softened by a more lived-in interior. A soapstone fireplace and Japanese soaking tub anchor the space.
The owner notes that the house continues to reveal itself over time. Bolts, joints, and steel transitions feel deliberate. Nothing is hidden. It’s a space where art and function sit side by side, where materials remain honest and legible, sitting somewhere between mid-century modern and a restrained form of brutalism.
The Workshop: Form and Function
The adjacent garage is where that philosophy becomes most tangible.
Originally conceived as a glass-blowing studio, the structure was designed with industrial gas lines, substantial heating, and large opposing doors to allow airflow and seasonal expansion. Those bones remain, now repurposed for automotive work.
Cars sit alongside tools, artwork, and objects collected simply because they matter. Nothing feels staged. It functions as both a workshop and a gallery: a place to work, then step back and look.
The garage is not precious, but it is considered. It’s used as intended: a place for machines and a space for hands-on problem solving. Music plays while projects unfold. Doors stay open in the summer. Light moves through steel and glass in a way that makes even routine work feel elevated.
Adaptability and Identity
What makes the A-frame compelling isn’t just its suitability for cars, but its flexibility. The owner is quick to point out that the space could support any kind of making such as woodworking, fabrication, or anything where building and reflection exist side by side.
The architecture doesn’t dictate a lifestyle. It supports one, a quality also seen in projects like the Black Barn, where cars coexist with broader creative work.
That adaptability may be the project’s greatest strength. It’s a place shaped by passion, refined through use, and quietly confident in what it is. Like the cars inside it, the A-frame isn’t about perfection, but instead it’s about intention, history, and the satisfaction of understanding how things are built.
And occasionally, it carries a reminder that even the most considered spaces can have a past you wouldn’t expect.
