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Homeowner and builder Mike Miller is an avid car collector, so it was only fitting that he build a showcase to house his collection in an underground, James Bond-worthy garage (centre). The car exits through the ceiling, thanks to a scissor lift.
DEEP INSIDE THE UNDERGROUND workshop of his Victoria home, Mike Miller’s 1960 Porsche Roadster is perched on a four by three-metre elevator platform, washed, waxed and ready to hit the road. With the flick of a switch, the custom-made scissor lift begins its ascent, raising the vintage vehicle three and a half metres through a trap door in the ceiling to the main floor of the garage above. A James Bond-worthy car emerges from its hidden lair.
Blasted into the cliffs above Gonzales Bay, the 1,800-square-foot subterranean garage-accessed through a door off the basement family room-is one of the signature elements of Miller’s striking contemporary residence in the posh Victoria enclave of Oak Bay. "I really wanted a three-car garage but I just couldn’t make it work on this lot, so we decided to dig down into the rock," says Miller, who also owns a 1972 Ferrari Dino and a Mercedes 280SL.
The futuristic space seems in perfect step with the contemporary aesthetic on display throughout the 6,000-square-foot home, where sleek lines, minimalist vintage decor and a stripped-down construction style offer an innovative take on laid-back West Coast modernism.
Intent on maximizing the view potential of the narrow property, Miller anchored the structure around a two-storey circular entryway from which all the home’s supporting beams emanate, dictating a wide-open floor plan defined by curved walls, subtle geometric transitions and "ridiculous amounts of natural light," as Miller describes it.
"I wanted to build it out like a fan in order to get the feeling of a bigger frontage. That’s why it’s called Radius," says Miller. Stepping into the crescent-shaped main living area, a gently curving wall of four-metre-high windows framed in vertical-grain solid fir spans the entire width of the main floor, revealing a panoramic view of the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the hazy blue-white peaks of Washington state’s Olympic Mountains beyond.
The focal point of the main room is a custom-made semi-circular sofa with orange leather cushions and zebra-wood backing that would look right at home in Dean Martin’s living room, complemented by a pair of Womb chairs. A two-way gas fireplace separates the living area from the dining room, where a stainless-steel light fixture resembling floating planets hovers above a solid cherrywood table and chocolate brown leather chairs.
Miller worked closely with Victoria-based interior designer Robyn Meredith Bryson, whose vision was to create contrasts by combining modern decor with futuristic touches that echo the ultra-contemporary design of the house. That aesthetic is seen in details like the stainless-steel mosaic on the backsplash of the kitchen coffee bar, the mosaic glass inserts in the curved living room steps and the television mounted on a steel post rising from the cut concrete floor.
A stainless-steel and glass staircase in the main entrance winds upstairs to the master suite, where curved, boardroom-style double doors open to a custom-made, freestanding bed with wraparound walnut headboards, set beneath a trio of floor-to-ceiling picture windows. Here we find a few right angles: in the master bathroom with a deep rectangular, polished white bath, custom-made from a pre-cast resin composite by Wetstyle. Cube-like Italian contemporary faucets by Hansgrohe complete the geometrical contrast, while the pebble-inlaid shower walls evoke a connection with the rocky shores below.
Perhaps its greatest design success is in the way that Radius literally sinks into the background, allowing the fabulous setting to take centre stage-one of the rewards, Miller says, of taking a "minimalist" approach to both the design and the decor. "It’s not as in-your-face as other houses," he says. "It’s over the top, but it’s also understated." wl
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