A Home from Sculptor’s Hands : Architecture: Shunning typical California box-shaped designs, this world-renowned artist’s buildings are recognizable by their terrain-sensitive molded appearance.

In quiet harmony with nearby reddish granite rocks, the 2,000-square-foot “sculpture” rises from the earth like a massive, smoothly eroded boulder.

It ascends gracefully above surrounding groves of yucca and manzanita. A small brown lizard suns itself peacefully atop one stone-like protuberance.

But this majestic creation in rural San Diego County provides comfort to more than the wild creatures of nature. It is one of the naturalistic homes designed by James Hubbell, a world-renowned sculptor and artist based in Julian, and built by his hand-picked cadre of wood, metal and glass artisans, engineers, construction specialists, architects and volunteering friends.

Hubbell has established an international reputation for his free-form sculpted structures. During his long artistic career he has designed about 20 public and private buildings, all in California and all based upon a rounded free-flow design far different from box-shaped, tile-roofed, plywood-based housing designs common today.

The buildings, including 12 residential structures, three restaurants (two of which were remodels), a chapel and two schools, are recognizable by their terrain-sensitive, molded appearances.

The seaside Triton Restaurant in Cardiff, for example, features wave-like interior walls, blue and white hues, undulating metalwork and tiled sea creatures. Its exterior colors closely match the nearby sand and ocean.

In contrast, Hubbell’s own home, located on a rocky high desert outcropping with oaks and manzanita, consists of several separate earth-toned structures that project a woodsy, cavernous security and warmth.

Most of the structures have smooth, rounded concrete, masonry or adobe exteriors painted in tones that match nature’s own. Ornamental stonework, spires, colored glass and tile often interrupt the otherwise subdued demeanor of many of the structures.

Hubbell admits that his work has been influenced by others who blurred the boundaries between art and architecture, designers as diverse as architects Frank Lloyd Wright, Antoni Gaudi and Bruce Richards, a now deceased San Diego architect for whom Hubbell once worked. Working for an architect while training as an artist gave him a unique perspective, he said.

Hubbell, a lanky, soft-spoken man with shy, boyish eyes, said, “I began from a less traditional perspective.”

Because of his training as a painter and sculptor, he is enticed by the effective use of light, shape and space.

Disturbing the environment as little as possible is also central to his concept of building, he added, because nature’s architecture deserves the greatest respect.

Hubbell’s free-form structures are generally secured through a steel I-beam rib system, along with the use of common black pipe, reinforcing bars, trusses and welding. Galvanized metal lath, thick urethane insulation, wood supports, a waterproofing membrane of nylon mesh and asphalt roof coating and other protective elements are covered by concrete, mortar or stucco and an exterior color coat hand-blended by Hubbell to match the surrounding landscape.

Stained glass, colored tile, sea shells and other gifts of nature are incorporated right into the structures. He has planted sea shells into sidewalks and ceilings, created colorful tile firebirds that seem to fly across the floor, designed spectacular stained glass windows that spill color prism-like across a room, and fashioned details as minute as blown-glass doorknobs, carved furniture and glass fixtures.

A house including Hubbell-designed doorknobs, plumbing fixtures, stained glass windows, wood or metal furniture and tiled floors costs considerably more than a basic structure with no extras. For just a basic structure design, rates start at about $150-$200 a square foot.

Hubbell’s first structure was his own home, located 50 miles east of San Diego. He and his wife, Anne, began building their home in 1958, hand digging the footings and avoiding the use of bulldozers. Wild vegetation was preserved. Friends spent weekends helping them mix cement and gather rocks in a child’s red wagon.

Combining the best of the contours of the land, the views, the oaks, the rocks, hand-fashioned adobe bricks and cedar, they completed a one-room house.

Today, the house has expanded considerably into several buildings, a pool and three artist studios. Newer sections feature bigger windows, more color, space and softer corners than the original one-room cabin. But the reverence for nature remains as evident as ever.

His quest, Hubbell said, is to create structures that provide physical comfort and an emotional attachment to the gifts of the earth. His goal is to create buildings that inspire people as does poetry, music or art. As with the fine arts, “What a culture thinks of itself really has a lot to do with how and what it builds,” Hubbell said.

“If our greatest monuments are our freeways, what will future generations say about us?” he asked. “Ten thousand years from now, freeways could be about all that is left of Los Angeles.” From that, anthropologists might one day conclude that “people seemed in a great hurry to get somewhere. And probably they weren’t sure where they were going because the roads went everywhere.”

Over 30 years ago, Hubbell rejected what he felt was this country’s product-oriented, machine-oriented society and his own “erratic” upbringing and youth.

He sought refuge and inner peace cloistered with his wife and young family inside the tiny-windowed little house. There, the couple’s four boys grew. So did the house. And so did Hubbell’s world view.

Now, having just turned 60, he has evolved from someone seeking solace from the world to someone seeking to bring the world solace. “One of the biggest things that has happened since I started out here and first married Anne is that my world has gradually gotten bigger and bigger,” he mused.

Evidence of that comes from publication of “Art Matters,” a journal put out by the Ilan-Lael Foundation, which he helped found about 10 years ago. The foundation describes its current mission as seeking “to recognize the importance of bridging the poet with the pragmatist, the thinker with the doer,” a philosophy that echoes Hubbell’s own practice--through his design work and his life--of bringing seeming opposites into harmony and challenging traditional boundaries.

The foundation is engaged in several projects close to Hubbell’s heart, including the building of a Hubbell-designed pre-school for impoverished children in Tijuana and the development of a cultural sister city exchange program between San Diego and Vladivostok, a Soviet Pacific Rim city. Hubbell and several other artists visited there a year ago and Ilan-Lael recently hosted a visit by Vladivostok’s mayor and other officials.

Ilan-Lael, Hebrew for “a tree belonging to God,” is also the name of the Hubbells’ homestead, which they open to the public once a year. Anne, whom Hubbell heralds for her inspiration and support, wrote a small, eloquent book about the evolution of their house entitled “Building From the Earth Up.” An open house earlier this year drew 600 people--from environmentalists, neighbors, writers and teachers to architects, artists and naturalists.

Hubbell’s work also includes sculpture, gate work, sculpture gardens and highly unusual projects such as the 18 richly splendid palace doors of Abu Dhabi. He collaborates with various architectural, engineering and artistic experts depending on the nature of the assignment.

Many have worked with him for years, including master blacksmith Bill Porter--who has collaborated with Hubbell for 20 years. Talented young artisans and craftsmen wishing to perfect their skills come to work in Hubbell’s studios. Even friends and neighbors have volunteered to trowel and paint.

Hubbell contributes to all aspects of his work--from design and model making to laying tiles and spreading mortar.

First, he meets residential or business clients to assess their motivations and desires (he is currently designing a home for a couple seeking “an organic contemporary Roman villa”).

Then, he “doodles a lot” until the form, function and inspiration blend to a finished design. After constructing models, he consults with the engineers and architects to formalize the structure and get all necessary building permits. That part, he said, can sometimes be the most difficult for his architects and engineers because government often responds to innovation with trepidation.

“It all gets down to fear. That’s why I have trouble because people are used to boundaries. I find even in the building industry that exciting things happen when boundaries are crossed. When more boundaries are established and rules become more rigid, things work less well.”

He theorized that one reason there seems to be so much current unhappiness in the building industry is because of a fear-based regulation system. There is fear of earthquakes, fear of becoming “like Los Angeles,” fear of being sued, fear of what constituents will think, fear of change.

Hubbell said many talented, less-traditional architects have grown increasingly frustrated by regulations that breed stale thinking and conformity. “It is partly due to communities and cities not having a vision of where they are going.” So they hide frozen in the false safety of what has gone before.

Through increasing regulation, such communities ensure that what has always been done will continue to be done even if it no longer works best, he said.

“It seems to me the more difficult a problem is, the more you have to be able to play with it. Every problem is both a wall and a door. You either go through the door where things are different and maybe better. Or you stay put and pound on the wall in frustration.”

The irony is that Hubbell’s structures are often praised in comparison to traditional structures for being more energy efficient, more beautiful, more earthquake resistant and more earth-friendly in terms of building materials and building methods.

“Most creativity is basically entering into chaos and then making order out of it. And it’s a continual process,” Hubbell said. “Cultures begin to think that the order is sacred or, at least, if you change it, you will destroy everything. But that’s not the way it works. That’s not the way nature works. And I don’t feel it is the way I work.”