When Kerry Marsh turned 70 last July, his wife Corinne threw a party at their oceanview home in Del Mar. The laidback festivities made full use of its friendly, open spaces. While a favorite musician performed Willie Nelson’s “Always on my Mind,” the couple’s three grown children and a smattering of close friends raised a toast, with the vast Pacific a scant distance away. It may have been Kerry’s birthday, but it was also the home’s debut.
Corinne and Kerry have been married for 41 years. Their family has migrated each summer from their hometown of Fort Lauderdale, Florida to North San Diego County since the kids were little. Kerry, a lifelong surfer, met Corinne at a Fort Lauderdale beach party when they were 16. He briefly studied architecture at college in Miami but soon dropped out to join friends on a five-month surfari from Baja to Guatemala. Back in Fort Lauderdale, he embarked on a development career. Today, his company converts abandoned big-box stores into storage facilities, among other large-scale projects.
Fifteen years ago, the Marshes began their search for a site in Del Mar where they could build their dream home. “In the end, it came down to a couple lots,” Kerry says. “Corinne liked this one best, and she was right.” Their one-third acre is only a stone’s throw from Torrey Pines State Beach—if the wind is right and you have a strong arm.
The Pacific Surfliner runs nearby, which doesn’t bother the Marshes. “I wanted to be close to the tracks because I love the sights and sounds of trains passing by,” Corinne says.
The Marshes’ lot formerly held a small 1950s bungalow designed by Del Mar modernist Herb Turner. While many other homes by Turner have been preserved, theirs was an obvious teardown. Their realtor had enlisted Solana Beach architect Brian Church to evaluate sites. He and the Marshes hit it off, and they tapped him for the new house’s design, which went through several iterations before it was approved by the Del Mar Design Review Board. Church’s plan was partly inspired by his love of Southern California modernists such as Richard Neutra and Rudolf Schindler, whose 100-year-old El Pueblo Ribera courtyard duplexes in La Jolla feature strong indoor-outdoor connections and simple materials.
Torrey Pines at the edge of the property were preserved as tributes to the Marshes’ three children.
As work began, the Marshes were clear about their priorities.
“I wanted to see whitewater and the waves rolling in,” Corinne says.
“It’s always view, view, view,” Kerry adds. That may sound too simple, but it really captures the home’s essence.
Kerry was not always a fan of modernist architecture, with its spare, no-frills approach. “The design changed at least four times,” he says. “The first version was French Country with a barrel tile roof, then it went more modern, like a lot of stuff I’d seen with wood, metal, glass, and stone. In the end, I’m glad it went the way it did. I really love the house now.
Every level of the home features decks and outdoor living spaces.
Construction began in 2018 and was completed in 2021. But it took two more years to “dial it in,” Kerry explains. “We worked on every room and went back and forth with ideas several times.”
Church’s design spreads 5,000 square feet among five levels connected by steps zigzagging between wide landings. Smaller spaces tuck into the slope, while voluminous sections face sweeping coastal views. A foundation of two-foot-thick retaining walls is anchored deep in solid sandstone. The rugged base supports open interior areas as tall as 19 feet, though they seem even higher, since the open plan lets you gaze from the bottom level all the way up to the entry landing. The house may be barely visible from the street, but there’s drama over the edge.
Walls of limestone blocks, dry-stacked without mortar, and smooth-troweled stucco precisely meet floors of limestone and wood. Railings and hardware are made of steel, stainless steel, and copper. Yucca, ocotillo, snake plant, agave, prairie grasses, and other species chosen by landscape architect Greg Hebert, who died in 2022, surround the home. Together, these elements conjure dreamy nights and days in Joshua Tree or Twentynine Palms.
A chandelier of crystal butterflies hangs in the entryway.
Kerry has often collaborated with Fort Lauderdale interior designer Michael Beamish, whose resume includes resorts in far-flung locales along with custom homes. Beamish, a charming Brit, brought a simple but elegant aesthetic that resonates with Church’s architecture. Furnishings are contemporary but subtle. Beamish used natural materials including wood grain, soft linens, and light-hued stone.
The primary suite is a fabulous lair, Corinne’s favorite place in the house for meditation, solitude, and pondering the ocean and sky. The Marshes enjoy sea views from a custom bed and swoopy freestanding tub. Beamish designed other bedroom furniture, too, like a daybed covered with organic chenille and additional pieces upholstered with fabrics from textile company Kravet. A wall of smart glass overlooks the vast, sometimes bustling central spaces. It goes opaque for privacy at the flick of a switch.
Above the fireplace is a custom surfboard like ones designed for big waves at Todos Santos.
A chandelier of crystal butterflies hangs in the entry. Nearby is an industrial-strength, steel-and-glass elevator like the one Kerry saw in a remodeled historical building in Switzerland. The kitchen features stainless steel appliances and light-toned Taj Mahal quartzite countertops. The adjacent dining and living room holds a plush Nathan Anthony sofa and Adriana Hoyos side chairs. Mounted over the built-in gas fireplace and flat-screen TV is a hardwood surfboard matching the contours of boards designed by legendary shaper Gary MacNabb for big waves at Todos Santos, the epic south-of-the-border break. This life-size replica is too heavy for surfing, but it’s a fabulous example of the surfboard shaper’s art.
The primary suite is a romantic retreat with custom furniture and fabrics, as well as photographer Aaron Chang’s triptych of dried leaves.
Recessed shelves line walls on each floor. They hold a fascinating, sometimes amusing array of family memorabilia, ranging from framed photos to ceramic objects and a model of cartoonish characters aboard a VW convertible towing a teardrop trailer. Most rooms showcase images by North County photographer Aaron Chang, best known for shots of surfers and coastal landscapes. Many of those are on view, but visitors wandering through will also see Chang’s abstract photos of oceanic textures and colors, as well as a triptych over the primary bed of large dried leaves that he came across in the Dominican Republic.
All told, the home is an homage to the stretch of Southern California coastline just outside its doors—which, for the Marshes, is what it’s all about.
“We wake up every morning, get our coffee, and sit on the patio, and my wife does not want to go back to Florida,” Kerry says. “I walk down the trail and surf behind the house. We walk on the beach every day.”
Limestone walls and white oak floors come together with soft-hued textiles and comfortable, modern furniture to create quietly elegant rooms.
“I love waking up here,” Corinne adds. “I raise the blinds and do a prayer and look out and feel like I’m so blessed to have this view in the morning and the sunsets at night. We both grew up middle-class, and we feel very lucky we’ve come this far and get to live here. It was always our dream, when we were young, to live on the ocean and see the whitewater coming in. We got pretty much everything we asked for.”
That includes a vanishing-edge pool, just past the built-in wet bar and custom pool table and through broad sliding glass doors. Lined with dark pea gravel, bordered by blue glass tiles and ipe hardwood decking, and furnished with chairs and chaise longues from RH Outdoor, it’s the centerpiece of this outdoor living room, a lovely place to relax most days of the year. At the property’s back edge grow three Torrey Pines that are special to Corinne—she preserved them as tributes to her three children. From just the right angle at sunset, you can imagine that the pool spills through the silhouetted trees and into the Pacific.
