Architect team applies high design to high tides San Francisco Chronicle Copyright 2013 San Francisco Chronicle. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Updated 3:51 pm, Friday, January 18, 2013 [...] the school was drifting away from postmodernism and settling around "unprecedented realism," as professors like Rodolfo Machado asserted that all public structures were fair game for forward-thinking design, even highway clover leafs, retaining walls and, perhaps, levees. [...] his love of music and design led him to the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, the incubator for world-class illustrators and performers founded by Walt Disney. In between design classes, Kuth learned to play a variety of little known and hard to pronounce percussion instruments (give 'mridangam' a whirl). In the late 1970s, he split his time between a world music ensemble in New England and the Connecticut office of Charles Moore, the architect best known locally for designing the Sea Ranch community. [...] the couple is certainly pursuing it as the former.They've assembled an advisory board of experts in hydrology, engineering and energy.