Amplified is proud to partner with some of the Bay Area’s most talented architects, builders, and interior designers. Among them is Field Architecture, a Palo Alto-based firm led by father-and-son team Stan and Jess Field. Their design process begins with the land itself—carefully considering the climate, topography, soil, hydrology, flora, and fauna to guide the relationship between structure and nature. We caught up with Jess to discuss Field Architecture’s philosophy and congratulate him on the release of their monograph, Conversations with the Land.
AL: Congratulations on the continued success of Field Architecture’s Conversations with the Land, what prompted your father, Stan, and you to publish it?
JF: Printing a book on paper is a special thing. It’s a timeless way of sharing ideas and telling a story. There’s something about the tactile experience of a book that slows us down and allows us to tune in a way that we might have otherwise missed.
A book about architectural work is never truly finished. The hardest part is knowing when to stop and say, this is it. Publishing the book becomes a way of marking a moment in time—a kind of anchoring. Conversations with the Land traces our journey from our beginnings in South Africa to Stan’s formative years in Lou Kahn’s Master class and provides context for a detailed look at the last decade of houses built across the California landscape where we’ve made our home.
AL: How did your father’s graduate studies under Louis I. Kahn influence Field Architecture?
JF: Stan received a scholarship to study with Kahn in Philadelphia, which was extraordinary in itself. But context matters: this was during apartheid years in South Africa, where our family is from. Suddenly, he found himself in the heart of the American civil rights movement, immersed in Kahn’s thinking about architecture rooted in making space about structure and light.
Kahn wasn’t just talking about buildings—he was talking about humanity. That encounter shaped everything. It gave my father a lens for seeing architecture not just as design but as a way of shaping how people live.
When Stan returned to South Africa and received his first commission—to design a home on the wild outskirts of Johannesburg—he couldn’t wait to bring that thinking into dialogue with the land. That spirit—of listening to all the natural forces that shape a place and designing with humility and intention—is something we’ve carried into every project since. It’s in the DNA of FIELD.
AL: Growing up with a father who is an architect, did you ever want to pursue another profession?
JF: My father had his work at home wherever we were. Books, drawings, and pencils were on every surface, and he was drawing constantly. Then there were the drawing boards, standing, adjustable drafting boards. I developed a passion for drawing at an early age and haven’t stopped since. I don’t think I ever made a definitive decision to become an architect. It was more like being drawn into a conversation that had already begun before I could name it.
There were other interests, and each gave me great pleasure—surfing, music—but architecture was always there, quietly pulling me in. I often thought of it less as a career but as a way of seeing. Watching my dad work and listening to how he spoke about buildings and land was less about forms and more about questions—about how we live and engage with the world around us. Giving that shape comes with great responsibility, and I’ve never imagined anything more exciting.
AL: Your architecture pierces the veil between the built and natural worlds; how do you accomplish that?
JF: I spent my childhood surrounded by nature and wildlife and have always revered the natural world. At our highest capacity, I see us as part of nature. How we make our homes fit into their natural surroundings is imperative for building a more symbiotic relationship with our environment, and it also affects how well we live.
Field starts with gaining a deep understanding of the places we design in. I’ve found that there are no shortcuts. We spend time on the land. We study it and map every aspect of it. We also walk it and spend time understanding the terrain, how the light moves, how the winds shift, how the ecology adapts to the changing seasons, and where the water goes after rain. We’re not looking to place a building on a site but to discover what’s already there and what’s waiting to be revealed.
Architecture, at its best, doesn’t impose. It enters into a relationship with the topography, ecology, and the stories embedded in the soil. We think of our work not as structures but as continuations of the landscape—something that feels inevitable, that couldn’t be anywhere else. When it’s right, it can be felt instantly.
AL: How do the topographies of South Africa and Northern California compare?
JF: They’re both landscapes of extremes—raw, powerful, varied—but in different ways.
South Africa holds this vast, elemental beauty. It’s rugged, open, and dramatic. The great escarpment forms a topographical plateau, which creates a vertical divide, and the unique ecological biomes follow.
Northern California has a similar rugged quality along the coast and is softer as we cross into the coastal ranges. Both have Mediterranean climates, but California also has a diversity of desert and highland climates. What they share is a certain wildness and incredible beauty.
Both places ask for attention. Both demand that we adapt to them, not the other way around. That’s where the work begins.
AL: Why do you still draw by hand?
JF: I sometimes think of drawing as my first language.
Technology is central to how we work, and we’re constantly pushing the envelope of how we can use it, design, and understand more precisely how the materials that make up a building are put together. Yet, drawing by hand is still always there. Drawing has a certain immediacy to it. A directness between the brain and the pencil—between the feeling and the form—is hard to replicate. We often design together, in conversation, and the sketches become guiding parts of the conversation. It’s not about nostalgia. It’s about exploration and discovery. We use digital tools obsessively to refine, to test, to build. But the origin—the soul of the project—usually starts with a line on paper.
AL: Who is your favorite architect, past or present?
JF: It’s hard to name just one. I carry different architects with me at various times, and many architects are doing great work.
Of course, Kahn is always there, and there’s Neutra and others. But honestly, it’s often not the famous names that stay with me. It might be a stone wall built by hand several hundred years ago or a simple farmhouse perfectly sited in a working field. Sometimes, the best architecture doesn’t announce itself. It just feels right.
AL: How do you incorporate technology into your designs?
JF: Some homes need just a few well-placed lighting controls, subtly enhancing what the architecture is already doing. Others—where the experience of light and sound needs to unfold in layers—require a more integrated approach. In those cases, we design systems that extend the site’s natural rhythms, using technology that aligns with its circadian logic.
But the goal isn’t to be high-tech. The goal is to be in tune—with the land, the family who will live there, and the purpose of each space. When technology supports that vision, we treat it like any other building material: essential, intentional, and thoughtfully integrated into the place’s experience.
Ultimately, it’s about clarity—a kind of simplicity that allows us to fully engage with the space through all our senses and feel deeply connected to the natural world.
