Inside Eagle Point Equestrian: A Modern California Barn Designed for Healthy Living

Welcome to Eagle Point, where the environment is as tranquil as it looks.

Situated in the rolling hills of wine country in Livermore, California is Eagle Point Equestrian, a beautiful equestrian property, owned by Gundi and Peter Younger. Inspired by John Blackburn’s book, “Healthy Stables by Design” and designed by Blackburn Architects, her barn features a clean and modern aesthetic built for California’s warm climate while adhering to building restrictions due to wildfire threats.

Photography by Arrowood Photography and Nicole Beales Photography

Credits:

Architect – Blackburn Architects

Barn – Castlebrook Barns

Tony Judge of Olympia Footing – footing install

Kurt Pesutich of Pacific Dirtworx – grading and dirt work

Gundi grew up in Germany, where she began riding at age six. Her father leased a pasture, built a small stable, and brought home two ponies. While her brother quickly lost interest, she was hooked. Growing up, she asked for riding lessons for birthdays, holidays and worked after school and on weekends at the local riding school to support her passion.

At sixteen, she purchased her first horse, Tip Top, using money she had saved throughout her childhood. She boarded him with a dairy farmer behind her home and worked to cover his expenses. When she could no longer afford his care, she made the difficult decision to sell him—only to buy him back years later when she was financially able, keeping him for the rest of his life.

Fast forward into adulthood, Gundi met her husband, Peter, and moved to London. Her horse accompanied her to London, where she cherished rides along the River Thames with views of Windsor Castle. After taking a break during her pregnancies with her sons Jakob and Tyler, she returned to the saddle and purchased a spirited four-year-old mare in Holland, importing her to the UK. That mare, Renatino, lovingly known as “Sam” eventually became the foundation of her breeding program and the matriarch of her barn.

Gundi and Sam learned dressage together, competing lightly in young horse classes in England before relocating to Walnut Creek, California. Starting at First Level when Sam was five, they progressed to Grand Prix, training with numerous talented riders along the way. Over the years, Gundi added several young horses to her herd, gaining valuable experience in developing each horse through the levels and earning opportunities to qualify and compete at the USEF Young Horse Dressage National Championship.

The next chapters of her equestrian journey continued onward after her kids grew up and her husband retired from a job that previously had him traveling the world.

Ready for a lifestyle change, it was time to purchase land and build a barn of their own. And a house of course, but the barn came first, Gundi explained.

“It was a thorny and arduous adventure. Dealing with the county and various agencies involved in the permitting process, ever increasing building costs, then Covid-19.. We got it done eventually. It all started with the idea to have our horses at home and share the space with a few friends. And over the last several years it grew organically into a small boutique boarding and training facility. My son Tyler met his now wife Cecily when they were both quite young and doing IEA. Eventually it became clear that they were very committed to each other and Cecily was on her path to become H/J trainer, just like her mother. Today, Cecily has her own successful training program, Underwoods Farms, and together we are running our ranch. We work very well together and help each other often; I help her with her flat work, and she helps me with cross training my horses. We are very fortunate that we have such a great relationship, and our families are very close.”

For Gundi, the barn is an extension of her home, which she lovingly refers to as her Home Away From Home. She decorates seasonally, adorns her barn walls with many of her horse and dog and travel photos, keeping fresh flowers around, just like she does at home.

Barn Interior

Eagle Point features a main barn with 6 large stalls, all with access to attached paddocks. The main barn features a spacious office/lounge, a large tack room, 2 wash stalls and 2 grooming stalls, a kitchen, feed room, and storage room.

Additionally, there are two 4-stall barns with 50 x 75’ paddocks. A later addition to the facility included 5 more with paddocks that Cecily keeps some of her clients in. There are a total of 19 stalls, turnouts, a dedicated hand grazing area (the grass and pasture is hard to maintain in California), a covered round pen and an all-weather riding arena with Otto Sport ebb & flood system and Premier Equestrian footing.

Tack Room

Barn Office/Lounge

The bright and beautiful office/lounge is flooded with sunlight and overlooks the arena with its sizable glass windows. It offers a space to rest and relax, appointed by thoughtful details.

Feed Room

Gundi grew up in northern Germany where the winter months are long and dark. It was very important to her to have windows everywhere. She wanted to see the beautiful California skies and sunshine from every possible angle.

Gundi had a clear vision for the barn, working closely with Blackburn Architects helped bring her concept of a horse-first, healthy stable to life. Early in the design process, she focused on Castlebrook Barns, drawn to their finishes and their ability to customize nearly every detail—from stall dimensions and door heights to groom stalls and window sizes. The company collaborated seamlessly with Blackburn Architects, adapting the architectural plans to fit their system. Once the site work was complete, the barn components were delivered, and the structure was assembled in approximately three weeks.

Gundi loves that all the horses have 24/7 access to large outdoor spaces and have neighbors they can play with and groom. The layout of the structures is designed so she can see all the horses from the main barn’s front porch, where she walks in and out all day long. That ensures she notices right away if a horse isn’t well or is acting unusual in any way.

Covered Round Pen

Tony Judge of Olympia Footing was instrumental in the development of the ranch. He not only built the arena and installed the round pen footing, he did the demo of old structures, added extras to the barns and other structures, and was overall an amazing advisor, Gundi explained.

“Kurt Pesutich of Pacific Dirtworx was our expert for all grading and other dirt work all over the property. We can cope with atmospheric river storms and our horses do not stand in mud.”