A New Angle -- Both The House And The Art That's In It Play Off Geometric Shapes

WHEN CHARLES SIMONYI DECIDED to build a house five years ago, he wanted a contemporary structure that would still look fresh 50 years from now.

Time alone will tell whether Simonyi (pronounced si-MOAN-ee) got his wish. But for now, the house on the eastern shore of Lake Washington stands as a striking example of modern architecture and a tribute to its owner's singular vision.

Broad and angular, with walls clad in white synthetic stucco, the house looks impenetrable from the street, but is virtually transparent in back, where floor-to-ceiling windows are framed by an eroded grid of tinted glass. Architect Wendell Lovett likens the grid to a veil - shading the interior and suggesting a sense of enclosure without obscuring the view.

In order to see that view to its best advantage, Lovett designed the 5,000-square-foot house like a tower, with four floors above grade and a basement below. The plan boosts the living spaces above the neighboring rooftops and gives the hillside home greater presence from the street, but doesn't block the view from the park across the way.

The interior of the house is minimalist - some might call it cold - with few furnishings and just an occasional touch of red and blue to break up the white, gray and black palette. Every architectural detail is figured with machinelike precision, yet the structure is anything but predictable. Because the lot is shaped like a trapezoid, Lovett torqued walls at a slight angle to each other, producing odd-shaped corners, tabletops, columns and floor tiles that add unexpected intrigue to the home's rigid geometry.

"In a sense, we took a grid, but put it in a quirky shape, so you get odd things happening around the edges," says Lovett.

Simonyi sees the same concept at play in the work of Op Art pioneer and fellow Hungarian Victor Vasarely, whose paintings, prints, sculptures - even dinnerware - adorn the interior. Vasarely creates a pattern out of geometric shapes, then varies some of those shapes to add interest to the pattern. "I call it digital art," says the homeowner, a computer scientist who directs one of the programming departments at Microsoft. "It reminds me very much of how computers operate. It's a form and an inversion of the form; shades are very seldom used."

Since Simonyi is single, he asked Lovett to design the house in three zones, to accommodate both his present needs and the needs of a future family - his own or a subsequent owner's.

The top two floors were designed like a bachelor's penthouse, with open-plan living quarters clustered around a two-story atrium. Artworks border a cozy seating area tucked beneath a lofted office. Simonyi considers the latter his favorite room. From here, he commands a view of the lake, the living room, his art collection and the glass-enclosed dining room two stories below.

The master suite is tucked behind a storage wall covered in Pollene, a lacquerlike polyester finish used on doors and cabinets throughout the house. A narrow skylight crowns the master bedroom and continues down the hall, ending at the master bath, where a circular shower stall divides the toilet area from the built-in tile tub.

Although the top two floors are connected by a stairway, the remaining three floors are accessible only by elevator - a concession Simonyi made to maximize the available floor space.

The second floor contains a family room, a suite of bedrooms and a two-story dining room dominated by a custom table. Lovett designed the piece, which features a round glass top resting on steel struts that project from a cylindrical base. The kitchen next door is fitted with gray laminate cabinets, granite countertops, gray tile floors and sleek European appliances. A black aluminum channel mounted on the backsplash supports a carefully chosen array of cooking implements - none of which look used.

"I can't cook, but I can take everything apart," offers Simonyi, a mechanical whiz who admits to having disassembled the Gaggenau cooktop three or four times already.

The ground floor was designed for recreation. With its polished aluminum ceiling, gleaming tile floors and high-tech exercise equipment, the space looks like an upscale health club - the only difference being the original artworks by Vasarely and Roy Lichtenstein on the walls.

The house is a museum of contemporary design, and Simonyi its curator. Every purchase is carefully weighed against the strictest design standards, from audio components and appliances to the wall covers on the central vacuum system.

Simonyi was as particular when it came to choosing an architect. Never having built a home before, he decided to hold a competition for the job - a common practice for civic commissions but rare in residential projects. He invited several local architects to submit designs based on a highly detailed program, which even included a tongue-in-cheek list of appropriate smells for each floor ("spilled cheap champagne" on the ground level and "teak and expensive perfume" in the penthouse). For added inspiration, he brought a book on Vasarely's work to each architect's office. When he got to Lovett's, he found a Vasarely print already hanging on the wall.

"It sort of helped, I think," quips the architect.

Although the house, which was built by Krekow Jennings Inc., earned a commendation in 1990 from the Seattle Chapter of the American Institute of Architects, client and architect still consider it a work-in-progress. Simonyi recently purchased the neighboring lots, and has asked Lovett to expand the house on both sides. The homeowner says he will enlarge the pool, workshop and family area, and create additional display space for art. Plans to build a guest house have been scrapped, however.

He bought the home across the street instead.

Seattle writer Fred Albert reports regularly on home design for Pacific, and is co-author of "American Design: The Northwest," published by Bantam. Greg Gilbert is a Seattle Times staff photographer.