Hasta La Ideas

Continuing our review of 2024, we reflect on some of the most striking residential interior designs on Dezeen from the past year including projects by Fala Atelier and Uchronia.

From muted minimalism to unusual colour blocking, the projects listed below highlight the scope of global interiors trends from the last 12 months.

In particular, designers were seen to delve into the eclectic histories of the homes they worked on to inform contemporary renovations.

Read on for Dezeen’s top 10 home interiors of 2024:

Duane House, USA, by OWIU

Readers praised the “beautifully executed” interior of Duane House, a mid-century renovation in Los Angeles with traditional Japanese influences.

The principals of local studio OWIU completed the project as a self-designed home. It features original red brick flooring, sliding shoji screens and delicate Akari lamps by iconic Japanese-American designer Isamu Noguchi.

Find out more about Duane House ›

Lovers Walk, Ireland, by Róisín Lafferty

Irish studio Róisín Lafferty, formerly Kingston Lafferty Design, was influenced by Mies van der Rohe’s 1929-designed Barcelona Pavilion when creating the striking floor-to-ceiling green marble wall within this family home in Cork.

Called Lovers Walk, the dwelling features a bold collection of colour and texture – from a “sensual” red quartzite kitchen to a swirly green oak-lined hallway.

Find out more about Lovers Walk ›

Relámpago House, Spain, by H3O

Another home interior that caught readers’ attention in 2024 is Relámpago House, a converted barn in Sant Just Desvern, Spain, which H3O studio renovated to reference a lightning bolt that struck the building generations ago.

The unusual floor plan features three jagged walls delineating colourful and angular spaces within the single-storey home.

“Transforming a story into architecture seemed to us a fascinating and fun challenge,” H3O told Dezeen.

Find out more about Relámpago House ›

087, Portugal, by Fala Atelier

Fala Atelier is a firm favourite among the Dezeen readership, consistently applauded for its distinctive interior designs. The Porto studio added its trademark oversized spots and stripes to this Lisbon home, which features custom cabinetry and pinewood flooring dotted with geometric walnut accents.

“We tried to diversify the material palette as much as possible while still making it quite banal,” explained Fala Atelier partner Filipe Magalhães.

“The choices are very Portuguese, but the mixture aims at being more than just that,” added the architect.

Find out more about 087 ›

Casa Ona, Spain, by Paloma Bau

One commenter declared Casa Ona “sublime” for the Valencian home’s textured tiles and exposed surfaces, which formed part of a renovation by local studio Paloma Bau.

Designed as an homage to the nearby sea, the interior was transformed from a dark and heavily partitioned space into a modern and functional home with exposed beams, sandy-coloured flooring and delicate fluted accents.

Find out more about Casa Ona ›

Collectors Home, the Netherlands, by DAB Studio

This 1920s Dutch house was renovated to reference the Amsterdam School – a movement from 1910 to 1920 that paid equal attention to the architecture and interior design of a building.

Interiors firm DAB Studio chose an Ettore Sottsass gridded feature wall and a sculptural green ladder for the Amsterdam home, which includes an eclectic selection of vintage and contemporary furniture.

“The interior has a free, creative spirit in which each element can stand on its own and be seen as art,” studio co-founder Lotte Bruns told Dezeen.

Find out more about Collectors Home ›

Univers Uchronia, France, by Uchronia

Praised by Dezeen readers for its dramatic maximalism, Univers Uchronia is the self-designed Parisian home of Uchronia founder Julien Sebban.

Sebban and his team chose glossy walls, ruched curtains and poured-in-place resin flooring for the 1970s-style apartment, which was created as “a manifesto of [the Uchronia] universe”, explained the founder.

Known for its application of vibrant colours and undulating shapes, the studio took home the title of emerging interior designer of the year at the 2023 Dezeen Awards and has since continued to create interiors in its distinctive style.

Find out more about Univers Uchronia ›

House of Gond, India, by Renesa

New Delhi architecture office Renesa balanced contemporary details with references to traditional Indian homes for this apartment in Pune, created for a fashion designer.

The home’s interior layout aims to capture the charm of typical Keralan bungalows known as nālukettu, which were designed with four halls or buildings surrounding a central courtyard.

A mixture of teak, rattan and antique chandeliers brings a subtle luxury to the home.

Find out more about House of Gond ›

Biarritz apartment, France, by Toledano + Architects

This Biarritz apartment captured readers’ attention for its fluid forms that take cues from its seaside location.

French studio Toledano + Architects renovated the dwelling with a wavy timber mezzanine to optimise the compact 70-square-metre footprint.

“The waves and the sinuous coast set the tone for the project, entirely drawn in curves,” said architect Gabrielle Toledano.

Find out more about this Biarritz apartment ›

House in Kutná Hora, Czech Republic, by Byró Architekti

Unexpected openings and colourful joinery were added to this 19th-century house in the Czech town of Kutná Hora, which Prague studio Byró Architekti renovated to “blur the boundary between the old and the new”.

The kitchen features pale blue painted cabinets and internal doors while a porthole window in this space also offers a glimpse of the home’s spiral staircase.

Find out more about House in Kutná Hora ›

The post The top 10 home interiors of 2024 appeared first on Dezeen.

An oversized concrete truss supports the gridded volume of N2, an office block in London completed by local studio Lynch Architects.

N2 is the third of four buildings designed by Lynch Architects and commissioned by developer Landsec as part of its wider regeneration of the area surrounding London Victoria station.

The studio said it designed its gridded form as an attempt to “make sense” of its dense and varied surroundings, which include Nova Victoria – a development named Britain’s worst new building in 2017.

“N2 seeks to make sense of the mess of buildings of wildly differing scales, periods, styles, materials and quality that typify the forecourt of London Victoria,” studio founder Patrick Lynch told Dezeen.

“Our aim has been to craft a gracious and elegant structure that mediates between the ‘too tall’ and ‘too small in contrast’ character of its neighbours, seeking a kind of effortless-seeming unity and urbane harmony,” he added.

The gigantic truss at the base of the building, which is made of steel over-clad in concrete, is the result of challenging site conditions. This includes the presence of Victorian sewers and tube lines beneath the plot, meaning that concrete pile foundations could only be dug at four points.

Lynch Architects used the form of this truss to wrap an “open and porous” ground floor level, which houses a large reception lobby and coffee shop accessible from three sides.

A granite floor and angular chestnut-clad ceilings bring character to this sheltered space, with the concrete of the truss ground down to reveal the aggregate, described by Lynch as “smooth to touch yet full of visual interest and delight”.

At the building’s western entrance, which sits 1.5 metres above ground level, a curving concrete ramp leads past a small pocket park, designed in collaboration with Muf and landscape architect J&L Gibbons.

On the base of N2 are 16 floors of open-plan offices, constructed using a steel frame designed to be recyclable at the end of the building’s useful life. The concrete floors and lift shafts were cast in situ.

Where N2 is overlooked by a neighbouring building to the west, Lynch Architects has placed the core of the building, containing bathrooms and circulation.

The office floors and larger terrace on floors 13 and 15 enjoy views out towards Buckingham Palace and the city beyond.

N2’s exterior is clad in prefabricated panels of double-glazing framed by anodised aluminium, with vertical fins in between providing sun shading and bringing rhythm to the facades.

“This gives the building a beautifully iridescent appearance that is highly reactive to daylight, changing from pale grey on a dull day, to bright white in sunlight,” described Lynch.

“It takes on the colours of the sky at dusk and works well as the backdrop to the white façade of the Victoria Palace Theatre, and the white render of its neighbour The Duke of York public house,” he added.

Previous projects by Lynch Architects include a barrel-vaulted extension to Westminster Coroner’s Court, for which the studio looked to create a “sympathetic architectural atmosphere“.

Elsewhere in London, Renzo Piano Building Workshop also recently completed a gridded office block called Paddington Cube, which is defined by curtain walls and an exposed steel structure.

The photography is by Rory Gaylor unless stated otherwise.

The post Lynch Architects seeks “unity and urbane harmony” with gridded office in London appeared first on Dezeen.

Promotion: window manufacturer Velux is sharing the results from its ambitious housing experiment called Living Places which sought to address critical environmental and health challenges.

In July and August this year, Velux invited nearly 100 architects, entrepreneurs, designers and journalists from 12 countries to live at its Living Places Copenhagen project.

It was conceived as part of its broader initiative to better understand how building design impacts residents’ comfort and satisfaction while assessing indoor environmental quality and its effects on human well-being.

It was created in collaboration with Danish architecture studio EFFEKT, consulting engineering firm Artelia and contractor Enemærke & Petersen.

The brand said it set out to pursue a progressive vision of constructing buildings which serve the interests of people and the planet, addressing two fundamental issues: the climate emergency and human wellbeing.

Buildings and construction are estimated to make up 37 per cent of total global emissions, according to the United Nations.

First imagined in 2021, the housing experiment was built against five critical principles: health, sharing, simplicity, adaptability and scalability.

Velux said it was able to draw five overarching conclusions from the experiment. Firstly, the potential to use building materials which have as minimal impact on the planet as possible.

“Living Places Learnings shows that it is possible to build more sustainable and healthy buildings using standard materials, methods and technologies that are available today,” said the manufacturer.

The second conclusion drawn was the effectiveness of a “holistic approach” to homes, centred on the entire lifecycle of a building from its initial design to completion.

Velux argued that taking a holistic approach in focusing on comfort, energy and environmental parameters results in “healthy buildings that are good for people and the planet”.

Thirdly, the manufacturer concluded that creating an optimum indoor experience improves occupants’ mental and physical health, which is particularly imperative across European households where one in three residents experiences a negative reaction to lack of daylight, temperature, damp or noise, according to Velux.

“Over 70 per cent of Living Places guests reported improved mood, increased relaxation, and a sense of connection to nature while experiencing minimal negative effects,” added the manufacturer.

The fourth conclusion from the most recent experiment is that guests valued daylight and natural ventilation in their Living Places homes, which are designed to optimise both.

According to Velux, 83 per cent of guests chose to spend time in rooms illuminated by natural light and 90 per cent of guests were satisfied with the ease with which they adjusted fitted interior shadings.

“During their stay, 85 per cent of the guests perceived the houses to fit their functional needs,” reported the manufacturer.

“As part of creating well-being at home, functional factors like design, layout, temperature, lighting and indoor climate can invoke immediate feelings of physical comfort in a building.”

Velux’s fifth and final conclusion is that Living Places Copenhagen has achieved an indoor thermal environment within the European Standard‘s comfortable range.

Velux’s focus on how the buildings remain cool in summer months and warm during colder times of the year reflected growing concerns that architects should reflect “operating emissions” as well as measuring emissions during construction.

“During the experiment period, the indoor temperature was within the best level of the European Standard 89 per cent of the time in one house and 90 per cent of the time in the other and within the comfortable range of the European Standard 98 per cent of the time in both houses,” concluded the manufacturer.

For more information, visit the Velux website.

Partnership content

This article was written by Dezeen for Velux as part of a partnership. Find out more about Dezeen partnership content here.

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There’s something fascinating about watching a robot dog in action. Maybe it’s the uncanny lifelike movement, or perhaps it’s the realization that we’re inching closer to a future once reserved for sci-fi novels. I remember the first time I saw Boston Dynamics’ Spot bounding across a demo stage—it was all sleek power, like a show-dog bred in a lab. Now, with the Petoi Bittle X, you get a bite-sized version of that vision. But this one fits on your desk, doesn’t cost as much as a car, and—here’s the kicker—you can build and program it yourself.

We’ve been fans of Bittle X for years, but what we love about our prized little robot dog is that it shatters the myth that you can’t teach old dogs new tricks. Bittle X is always ready to learn, unlearn, and relearn new tricks, and will eventually inherit its own personality from you – the hacking master. How your Bittle X grows and evolves depends entirely on what tricks you teach it… and the best part is that you learn valuable STEM skills in the process too, as you help code actions and commands into your robot dog, now even with AI and IoT capabilities! In fact, Petoi’s been organizing online robotics competitions around the world to see how people hack/upgrade their robot pets using modules, custom parts, and a fair bit of AI and code.

Designer: Rongzhong Li

Click Here to Buy Now: $226.99 $279 ($52 off, use coupon code “10yanko” to get extra $10 off). Hurry, deal ends in 48-hours!

Bittle X is small enough to stand squarely on your palm, with a plastic chassis that’s sturdy enough for tumbles yet light enough for its bionic legs to handle. The legs, by the way, are where the magic happens. Unlike wheels, which might be easier to design and program, the legs give this robot a natural gait. Watching it trot, turn, and even pop into a backflip or a frontflip, you can’t help but smile—it’s as though someone shrunk Spot and sprinkled in a little whimsy. There are even damper springs in the legs’ slim enclosure to soften shocks to its precise gear system.

Easy to Develop AI, IoT and Robotics Applications for Quadruped Robot Dog

But this isn’t just a show pony—or, well, show dog. Bittle X is powered by Petoi’s BiBoard, an ESP32 microcontroller with enough ‘horsepower’ to support serious experimentation. Whether you’re programming it in C++ or Python or tinkering with its Scratch-like block-based coding interface, the robot is more than happy to follow your lead. I’ve seen plenty of “learn to code” gadgets, but few balance this level of flexibility with accessibility. Kids can start simple, chaining basic movements together, while more advanced users can dive into voice commands and sensor integration. For serious tinkering, Petoi offers ‘OpenCat’, their open-source robotic framework to endlessly customize your robot pet, or even build new pets on the same framework.

While most Boston Dynamics presentations involve a man behind the curtains with a massive remote controller, Bittle X goes a step ahead to let you intuitively talk to your dog through voice commands. Preloaded with over 35 tricks, it’ll respond to your orders with surprisingly fluid moves. Tell it to play dead, handstand, or execute that flashy backflip, and it’ll comply like a well-trained pooch—albeit one that runs on battery power. What really makes this feature shine is the option to program custom commands. Imagine having your robotic buddy perform a choreographed sequence to your favorite tune. TikTok would go nuts! If you’re a traditionalist, Bittle X does come with its own remote control and mobile app for an easier UX.

Bittle X is a tad bit more powerful than its sibling, the original Bittle. Its upgraded BiBoard gives it much more potential, including the ability to integrate AI into the dog. One such tinkerer, a data scientist by the name of Ömer Çolakoğlu, integrated ChatGPT’s API right into Bittle X, allowing him to have much more natural language conversations with his pet dog rather than rely purely on fixed voice commands. This AI-enhanced Bittle X could understand different languages, broadening its appeal and allowing people around the world to talk to their robot pets in the language they’re most comfortable with. Dogs, after all, don’t come with language barriers, do they?

For those who prefer to tinker under the hood, assembling Bittle X is half the fun. Available as a DIY kit, it invites you to piece together its limbs, circuits, and sensors like a tech-savvy Dr. Frankenstein. There’s something deeply satisfying about building your own robot, especially when it’s followed by the thrill of watching it take its first (albeit programmed) steps. It’s an educational goldmine, too. Kids and adults alike get a hands-on lesson in electronics, mechanics, programming, and robotics.

If you’re itching to level up, Bittle X is more than happy to oblige. Petoi offers optional add-ons, including a camera module that lets the robot “see” its environment and a sensor pack for detecting light, touch, gestures, and movement. With these upgrades, you can teach it to navigate obstacles or follow hand gestures. Suddenly, your desk-sized dog is doing things that wouldn’t look out of place in a research lab. In fact, universities like Harvard, MIT, and CMU have even used these toy-like quadruped bots in their own research papers.

Petoi also actively cultivates a vibrant community through engaging competitions. Take their Spring 2024 Robotics Challenge, for instance, where enthusiasts showcased their Bittle creations in imaginative scenarios. One standout was Martin Kuba, whose Bittle interacted with household robots, culminating in a delightful twist. Another, Reid Graves from Carnegie Mellon University, programmed his Bittle to autonomously detect and collect acorns – a fairly menial task for something that could become our robot overlord one day?? You decide! Even kids as young as 10 years old participated in creating new dance moves for Bittle X and programmed it to sing birthday songs.

Practicality, as always, comes with trade-offs. Bittle X runs on a rechargeable battery, offering about an hour of continuous walking. While that might not sound like much, real dogs don’t keep walking. It’s more than enough for an afternoon of experimentation or a few rounds of impressing your friends. Charging is easy, too—just plug it into a USB port, and you’re back in business… or build a solar panel onto the back of your dog, there’s an idea for you!

At $236.99 during the holiday sale, Bittle X is an accessible entry point into robotics, coding, and AI. Think of it as man’s best friend—if your best friend could do backflips and teach you to code. Whether you’re raising a future robotics genius or just want a four-legged gadget that doesn’t need feeding, Bittle X delivers. It may not be big enough to fetch your slippers, but it’ll definitely fetch some envy from your friends.

Click Here to Buy Now: $226.99 $279 ($52 off, use coupon code “10yanko” to get extra $10 off). Hurry, deal ends in 48-hours!

The post This $236 Robot Dog Obeys Voice Commands, Does Backflips, and even supports ChatGPT Integration first appeared on Yanko Design.

Saudi Arabia decided to upgrade and improve their transportation network. And they’ve designed a massive new driverless metro system which will be the longest in the world. The Riyadh Metro will begin on December 1 and will include the opening of three lines. Another line will open in January, and two more after that. It will occupy a total length of 109 miles, and it will connect main districts, business centers, and cultural landmarks throughout the capital city.

Designer: Zaha Hadid Architects

The metro will be able to hold 3.6 million daily passengers once fully completed. It will reduce road traffic quite a bit throughout the city and also reduce CO2 emissions by 12.5 million tons annually. The network will include 85 metro systems, the most renowned one is Zaha Hadid Architects’ King Abdullah Financial District (KAFD) Metro Station. The station is blessed with a thoughtfully designed and carefully calculated layout that will be easy for passengers to navigate. The exterior is equipped with an attractive latticed curving form that will take the brunt of the harsh summer heat.

69 Alstom Metropolis trains and 47 Innovia Metro trains will be employed. All the trains are electric. They will be classified into three classes – first class, family class, and singles class. They will also include ergonomic seating. The trains will also be equipped with LED lighting, air-conditioning, and a passenger information system. They are automated and have been used in Budapest, Sydney, and Taipei in the driverless transit systems.

“The trains are driverless,” said Alstom. “The train movements are protected by a state-of-the-art signaling system controlling the speed of the trains, ensuring smooth and safe operations including automatic opening of the train doors. The fully air-conditioned stations are equipped with platform screen doors also preventing people to access the track. The trains are also equipped with an advanced passenger information system delivering real-time information to the passengers through screens and loudspeakers on board the train and on the station platforms.”

The post Riyadh Welcomes The World’s Longest Driverless Transit System first appeared on Yanko Design.