A grid of chunky timber beams criss-crosses a void between the ground and first floors to allow light to circulate in this Studio Aula-designed house in Shiojiri, Japan (+ slideshow).
The client asked local firm Studio Aula to design a house in a typical urban neighbourhood that integrates traditional Japanese elements and makes the most of the existing garden.
A narrow plot informed the elongated footprint of the building, which also incorporates a ground-floor bedroom that projects out in front to accommodate the client’s elderly mother.
This bedroom helps to shield a secluded garden containing an old pine tree, as well as a series of stepping stones that create a pathway to the front door.
The entrance sits on a raised concrete plinth, which also supports a small wooden deck sheltered beneath a balcony and the house’s eaves.
A sliding door with vertical slits allows light and breezes to enter the interior and leads to a long corridor lined on one side with built-in storage.
The corridor continues from the entrance past the living area to a covered porch and parking space at the back of the property.
As the rear of the property faces a road, the architects built a storage space with a wall of slatted timber that references traditional Japanese screens and restricts views from the street.
“We created a multipurpose entrance to the north and the south garden that functions as a corridor and a storage space but also becomes a public space to connect inside with outside and to greet visitors,” the architects explained.
On the other side of the corridor is the open-plan living, kitchen and dining area, which can be screened off from the hallway by sliding across a door fitted with translucent panels.
The solid wooden beams form a geometric grid above this space, supporting bedrooms on the first floor.
Light enters this floor through windows and glazed balcony doors. It permeates the central void and the slatted balustrades and floors surrounding it.
Floors and ceilings throughout the house are made from wood that complements the structural beams and columns and provides a warm contrast to the grey tiles of the entrance corridor and the white walls.
This house in northern Switzerland, by local architect Pascal Flammer, frames views of a vast rural landscape through round and rectangular windows, as well as through entire walls of glazing (+ slideshow).
Located between a wheat field and a thicket of woodland, House in Balsthal is an archetypal wooden cabin with a steeply pitched roof and overhanging eaves, but also integrates modern touches such as full-height glazing and flush detailing.
Pascal Flammer specified timber for the building’s structure, cladding and joinery. Externally, the wooden surfaces are stained black, while inside the material is left uncoloured to show its natural grain.
Criss-crossing timber braces support the structure and are visible from both inside and outside.
The base of the house is sunken into the earth by 75 centimetres, allowing the surrounding ground level to line up with the bottom of windows that surround the building’s lower storey.
“In this space there is a physical connection with the nature outside the continuous windows,” explained Flammer.
A large fuss-free space accommodating a kitchen, living room and dining area occupies this entire floor. Cupboards built into the walls create an uninterrupted surface around the edges and can function as worktops, desks or seating.
While this storey features noticeably low ceilings, the bedroom floor above comes with angular ceilings defined by the slope of the roof. “The height defines the space,” said Flammer.
The upper floor is divided up evenly to create three bedrooms and a bathroom. Each room has one glazed wall, but the round window also straddles two rooms to create semi-circular apertures.
“Whereas the ground floor is about connecting with the visceral nature of the context, the floor above is about observing nature – a more distant and cerebral activity,” added Flammer.
A spiral staircase winds up through the centre of the building to connect the two floors with a small basement level underneath.
This wooden home in Helsinki by Finnish architect Tuomas Siitonen has a roof that dips in the middle to allow views across it and a kinked plan that wraps around a secluded garden (+ slideshow).
Constructed on a sloping plot in the garden of a house occupied by the client’s parents, the building was designed by Siitonen to provide two separate apartments – one for a couple and their two children, and another for the children’s great-grandmother.
The ground floor contains an accessible apartment for the great-grandmother, while a larger apartment for the family occupies the two upper storeys.
“The brief was to design an inspiring and environmentally sensible house incorporating a separate flat for a grandmother, or for example to be used by one of the children in the future,” Siitonen told Dezeen.
The new house’s plan kinks to accommodate the contours of the site and to wrap around the garden it shares with the existing hundred-year-old property, increasing privacy while maintaining a connection with its neighbour.
On the other side, the building presents a closed facade to a nearby road and railway, while its height allows views from the upper floors and balcony.
“The plot was a north-facing slope, so I wanted to build something that rises up to provide light and views,” said Siitonen.
“The slope faces a busy road and a railway, which is why the house is more closed on that side and opens up towards the garden, making a small sheltering turn that follows the slope to make the terrace feel more intimate and to take the garden into the house.”
Siberian larch cladding covers the building’s exterior. It will turn grey over time and Siitonen said it was chosen to reflect the house’s natural setting.
As well as the accessible self-contained apartment, the ground floor contains utility areas and a sauna.
Upstairs is an open plan living and dining area incorporating a custom-made kitchen built from flamed birch.
Large windows look out onto a large wood-lined terrace perched among the treetops that can be heated by a fireplace that backs onto another one inside the living room.
Another staircase leads past windows that look out over the treetops to a mezzanine that is intended to give the space the feel of a treehouse, and on to the master bedroom housed in the loft.
Sustainability measures were a key part of the clients’ brief and informed the use of wood throughout the project and the use of a ground-sourced heat pump and underfloor heating that removes a need for radiators.
Here’s a text about the project by Martta Louekari:
House M-M, Helsinki, Finland
Someone should pick the children up from day-care; the grandparents would appreciate a visit; who’d have time to cook and help with the homework? What if the whole family lived together, on the same plot, even under the same roof?
Actors Vilma Melasniemi and Juho Milonoff wanted a home where the entire family, including grand- parents and great-grandmother could spend their time together. They were looking for space for the family and friends to be together, but also for the chance for everyone to have some privacy and their own room. That way the grandparents could help with childcare and great-grandmother would have company and a feeling of security.
A place was found on the plot of mother Vilma’s parents’ home in Helsinki’s Oulunkylä. The location of the 100-year-old house – in a garden of apple and lilac trees with a steep north-facing slope – imposed its own demands on the design. What was wanted was a house that would be contemporary and yet homely and full of character, that would respect its surroundings and the site’s natural features but would still constitute a clearly self-contained whole.
The new home was designed with two apartments. The lower storey is a level-access studio-apartment for Vilma Melasniemi’s 91-year-old grandmother. The ground floor also includes sauna and utility spaces.
The 120 square-metre apartment upstairs is the home of Vilma Melasniemi and Juho Milonoff and their 8 and 11-year-old children. The upstairs is comprised of a large reception room and a kitchen, made to measure in flamed birch, that serve as the whole family’s living space. In the summer this extends effortlessly outdoors via a large terrace.
The three-storey building sits comfortably on the slope, the large windows bringing in the green outside and creating a feel of a tree house. The tree house-like atmosphere is enhanced by the loft space situated over the kitchen and the stairs leading to the master bedroom with its view over the tree tops. The exterior of Siberian larch changes with the seasons and will gradually turn grey.
Mother Vilma Melasniemi’s parents continue to live in their wooden villa on the same plot. Because the roof of the new building dips in the middle, it does not affect the familiar view from the villa to the rising slope across the plot. The footprint of the new-build follows the shape of the slope and creates a bend making the garden more intimate and shielding it from the public roadway.
One important consideration was the building’s ecological sustainability. Most of the building is made of wood. The building has floor heating coupled to ground-source heat so stand-alone radiators are not necessary. The energy needed for cooling in the summer also comes from ground-source heat. Because of its large south facing roof space, in the future it will also be possible to make good use of solar energy.
“The large windows bring light and warmth right into the house. The exterior doesn’t need maintenance and the open fireplace heats up with wood from our own plot. We travel to work and into town by train. We believe these are sustainable solutions. One good home in a lifetime is enough!” says Vilma Melasniemi.
Finland’s baby-boomer generations are ageing; a demographic peak of 65 to 74-year-olds is expected in 2020, and there is already a shortage of care-home places and staff. The working day is long and school-age children are often forced to spend afternoons either at after-school clubs or home alone. Well-designed models for multi-generational living and functional architecture can help meet these challenges in the future.
Cedar shingles typical to New England houses have gradually faded from warm beige to a soft greyish brown on the walls of this residence in Maine by Los Angeles office Bruce Norelius Studio (+ slideshow).
Recent photograph of the house, courtesy of Kelly Bellis
Bruce Norelius Studio completed House on Punkinville Road in 2008 for a couple looking for a change of lifestyle as well as a new residence. Five years on, the pair say the best quality of the house is its adaptability to the changing seasons.
Recent photograph of the house, courtesy of Kelly Bellis
“During a snowstorm, we don’t watch the storm, we’re inside the storm,” said the client. “The amount of glass and the way the glass is placed takes every advantage of the site. And the sun is a constant presence.”
He continued: “As the light changes from hour to hour, from room to room, from season to season, it changes the rooms. The living area is not the same room at sunset as it was at sunrise, nor is it the same in winter as it is in the spring.”
Located several kilometres inland from Smelt Cove, the house sits on an elevated site surrounded by juniper trees and blackberry bushes. A concrete base grounds the structure into the landscape, while the main walls are all clad with the humble cedar shingles.
“It’s gratifying to know the clients are enjoying life here, even during the harsh Maine winters,” said the architects. “The facades are simple, confident and holding true, telling their time naturally, which is a narrative we continue to embrace in our work.”
The building is primarily made up of two rectilinear volumes stacked over one another to create an L-shaped plan. This creates a sheltered driveway at ground level and a generous roof terrace on the first floor.
Proportions were based around a prefabricated window module, which is used throughout. Combined with a specification for a simple timber structure, this design concept allowed the architects to deliver the project on a low budget.
The interior layout was also kept as simple as possible, with a pair of bedrooms and bathrooms on the ground floor and an open-plan living, dining and kitchen space above.
Photography is by Sandy Agrafiotis, apart from where otherwise indicated.
Here’s a project description from Bruce Norelius Studio:
House on Punkinville Road
The genesis of this project came from the clients, a couple who had lived many years in a treasured 19th century cape, and who sought a significant change in lifestyle. Their deep appreciation of that cape and its particular relationship with its site made them realise that their new site – a spectacular inland promontory on ledge, juniper and blueberries with extensive views – required a very different architectural solution.
The concept that evolved was a perpendicular stacking of two simple volumes. This allowed a relatively small footprint on a pristine site, and also created useful negative space – a carport below, and an expansive deck above. Furthermore, it guaranteed that the house took advantage of the entire site, ensuring each space its own particular, appropriate relationship to sun, passive solar gain, and views.
The plan is simple and rigorous, based on the module of a single prefabricated window unit that is used throughout. The entirely-wood structural system was edited and refined to allow speed and clarity in the construction process.
The sober expression of the house responds intentionally to the climatic demands of the site, and is clad humbly in white cedar shingles, the most traditional of New England building materials, and exactly what was used on that cape built a century and a half ago.
The priority on the interior was to create calm spaces deeply influenced by the seasons and weather. A remarkably low construction cost was achieved because of the clients’ ability to prioritise goals, the design team’s search for simplicity in both aesthetics and construction techniques, and the builder’s ability to propose alternative, less expensive solutions for aspects of the building.
A sequence of vaulted ceilings and arched openings sets up layered vistas through the interior of this beach house in Southern California by Los Angeles firm Johnston Marklee (+ slideshow).
Johnston Marklee planned Vault House as a twist on the boxy “shotgun houses” that were typical in southern USA until the 1920s. Although the building has a simple rectilinear form, its volume is punctured on all sides by arched windows and recesses.
The same motif is repeated throughout the interior, creating a series of vaulted doorways, rooms and corridors that conclude with a large framed view of the beach and ocean.
“With the assembly of stacked and unidirectional vaulted rooms contained within a simple rectilinear volume, the parallel orientation of the rooms acts as a filter that extends the oceanfront view,” said the studio.
Local planning regulation stipulated that the house needed to be raised two metres above the sand and be collapsible in the event of a tsunami. This allowed the architects to create a split-level two-storey home with a car parking garage slotted underneath at the back.
An arched entrance leads into the house via a central courtyard that helps light to penetrate the interior, but also creates a natural division between the living spaces at the front and bedrooms at the back.
Vaulted forms overlap one another throughout these spaces, helping to outline different spaces and frame a number of artworks belonging to the owners.
“With varied contours and volumes, each vaulted room defines an area or a function in the house. The combined effect is a varied landscape of interior spaces, unified with a singular formal language,” added the architects.
Outer walls are coated with a cement membrane to protect them from the elements, while floors are finished in limestone. A single staircase connects each level and also leads up to a terrace on the roof.
All photography is copyright Eric Staudenmaier and used with permission.
Here’s the text description from Johnston Marklee:
Vault House Oxnard, California
Situated in a densely developed beach site in Southern California, the Vault House challenges the typology commonly found on narrow oceanfront lots. Instead of directing its focus on the single prime ocean view, an array of transparent interior spaces layered inside the main volume, offer a multiplicity of oblique views through the house while capturing natural light from a variety of angles.
With the assembly of stacked and unidirectional vaulted rooms contained within a simple rectilinear volume, the parallel orientation of the rooms acts as a filter that extends the oceanfront view from the beachfront facade to the west through to the street at the Eastern boundary of the site.
The house was designed under the restrictions imposed by the California Coastal Commission, which require the main living area to be lifted two meters off the sand, allowing for possible tsunami waves to pass beneath the house.
The garage to the East along the street, in contrast, sits directly on the sand and is designed with walls that collapse under the pressure of tsunami waves. This results in an asymmetrical section, where three floor levels – first floor, split level, second floor – are grouped around a courtyard that serves both as the main entrance to the house and as a central outdoor room.
The courtyard forms the core of the house: it negotiates between the more private rooms on the eastern side of the house and the open and connected areas to the west. In the courtyard, natural light enters in rotating cycles throughout the day and residents can be observed moving throughout the house from this central space.
A single-run stair located along the northern side of the house connects all three levels and leads to a roof deck that offers panoramic views of the beach and the ocean.
With varied contours and volumes, each vaulted room defines an area or a function in the house. The combined effect is a varied landscape of interior spaces, unified with a singular formal language. Similar to the paradigm of a shotgun house, the singular direction of the vaults maximises the visual connection of all spaces within the deep building footprint and incorporates the exquisite exterior landscape of beach, ocean and horizon into the depth of the building.
The extreme beach climate with pervasive winds and salty air demanded a simplified, weather resistant material palette. Limestone is used for all floors and as wainscots, both inside and outside, while an elastomeric, cementitious membrane called “Grailcoat” wraps the exterior facade. The membrane eliminates the need for metal flashing and control joints, rendering the facade scaleless and forming an abstract backdrop for the play of light and shadow.
This solitary wooden cottage on the Norwegian island of Vega was designed by Swedish studio Kolman Boye Architects to resemble the weather-beaten boathouses that are dotted along the island’s coastline (+ slideshow).
The traditional sheds, known as Naust, are common to Norway’s seaside towns and villages, so architects Erik Kolman Janouch and Victor Boye Julebäk decided to pay tribute by creating a small residence that resembles a pair of cabins.
“We have aimed to build a contemporary Naust with an unpretentious presence and a distinctive character, developing themes from the vernacular architecture,” they said, referencing the simple materials and gabled profiles.
Vega Cottage was built over the uneven terrain of a rocky outcrop near the coastline. “The site is distinctive for its grand and harsh northern landscape with wide panoramas of the Norwegian Sea and the jagged mountains rising from it,” said the architects.
A pathway leading to the entrance sits within a natural ravine, so as not to disturb views across the landscape. As a result, the house appears to be completely cut off from any other traces of civilisation.
The architects used pine to build the structure then added birch joinery details. Exterior walls are left exposed, while interior surfaces are painted white.
“The interior is kept subtle with a character of being hand-built, promoting tactile qualities and the attractive patina developed over time,” added Kolman Janouch and Boye Julebäk.
The largest space in the two-storey building is a family living room that occupies one half of the ground floor and features a stone fireplace.
Two oversized windows offer views out towards the ocean and the surrounding mountain range, while a door opens the space out a terrace flanked by two walls.
Other spaces on this floor include a lobby with a wall of storage. Bedrooms and smaller family rooms are located upstairs.
Read on for the full description from Kolman Boye Architects:
Vega Cottage
The house stands on the island of Vega in the Norwegian archipelago not far from the polar circle. The site is distinctive for its grand and harsh northern landscape with wide panoramas of the Norwegian Sea and the jagged mountains rising from it.
Not far from the site, near the ocean shore, stands a group of traditional seaside huts, in Norwegian called Naust, whose forms and materials reflect many years’ experience of building in these conditions. The outermost hut shelters those behind – the huts being placed at odd angles to each other, partly due to topography and partly due to chance. The windowless weathered wooden facades have a straightforward tectonic and a strong material vocabulary.
We believe that good buildings engender the refinement of everyday life, having a curious, evocative and empathic nature. We have aimed to build a contemporary Naust with an unpretentious presence and a distinctive character, developing themes from the vernacular architecture.
Seemingly growing from the landscape, the house sits on a rock beneath a granite shoulder negotiating the uneven terrain. As not to disturb the dominant view towards the sea, access to the house is given through a narrow natural ravine densely grown with gnarled birch shrubs and laid out with sea-sand from the nearby shore. The landscape remains untouched and wild.
The large windows of the house face three directions, each with its strong unique characteristic. They are simple and robust in detailing and the optically white glass conveys undisturbed frames of the ocean, the mountain range and the bedrock.
Organised on two levels adapting to the terrain, the plan is compact, providing generous social spaces within a limited floor area. The upper level is comprised of smaller scale bedrooms and family rooms, whereas the lower level is a large gallery-like space structured around a stone hearth. Completed in linseed oil painted pine with untreated birch skirting, frames and reveals, the interior is kept subtle with a character of being hand-built, promoting tactile qualities and the attractive patina developed over time.
Upon completion of the house the clients’ father, who spent his childhood in the close vicinity, visited the cottage. Being able to sit down – for the first time – sheltered from the elements; he stayed seated for several hours silently observing the ever-changing light over the sea.
Hinged panels discretely integrated into the facade of this house in Parede, Portugal, by Lisbon architect Humberto Conde protect the property when the owners are away. (+ slideshow).
Humberto Conde designed the family home for a narrow plot next to a three-storey property that informed the overall dimensions of the new building and the position of its street-facing elevation.
To the street, the house presents a minimal facade covered in cement panels and punctuated by narrow vertical windows. The hinged shutters fold down to conceal the windows, protecting the property at night and when the family is on holiday.
“The new building promotes a dialogue between the surrounding area by a language of contrast in its image and shape regarding all the spatial articulation principles that mark the adjacent building,” said Conde.
At ground-floor level, the entrance is shielded by a small boxy canopy, while the hinged shutters that conceal the kitchen and laundry can be folded upwards to admit natural light and views toward the street.
The gently sloping courtyard at the front of the house provides space for parking two cars, while a large patio at the back is surrounded by vegetation and incorporates a lap pool that is illuminated at night.
A long corridor leads from the entrance to the kitchen on the left and into the main living and dining area, which is connected to the garden by full-height sliding glass doors.
A staircase located to the right of the entrance ascends from the corridor to a first floor containing two bedrooms.
Next to the master bedroom is an antechamber between the dressing area and en suite bathroom, which contains a square, swivelling window.
This window looks out at a sculptural tree in a sheltered courtyard with frosted windows on either side, allowing light and ventilation to reach the bathrooms.
A door from the master bedroom provides access to a balcony overlooking the garden at the rear of the house, which projects over the patio below to shade the living spaces.
On the second floor is a third bedroom and doors that open onto a large roof terrace.
Similarly to the hinged panels on the house’s minimal front facade, these doors sit flush with a dark wall that gives the terrace a contrasting appearance to the rest of the white exterior.
The project aims to develop a single house located in the centre of Parede, Cascais, in a site characterised as Historical Urban Space. The lot of the house as a particular elongated and thin configuration like the adjacent lot on the left side – south. The nearby buildings are part of a summer houses morph-typological group that proliferated in the Portuguese coastline in the 40s, 50s and 60s.
These houses were usually built as second houses or summer residences, presenting, in general, a garden that involves them throughout their perimeter. The exception is made in smaller lots of recent date where it was usual the implantation of terraced houses, as a way to potentiate the opposite top sideband.
In this particular case, given the lot’s configuration and taking into account the adjacent house (with three floors above the ground and one basement), we believe that the new construction should certainly be marked out through these alignments, namely the build’s height, volumetry and the alignments of the main facade.
The new building should promote a dialogue between the surrounding area by a language of contrast in its image and shape regarding all the spatial articulation principles that mark the adjacent building – as well as by the used construction details, such as window openings, metric of the facades and visual relation with the exterior.
Safeguarding a small courtyard at the entrance of the house – access area to the parking lot and the house – that assures the alignments, the new building is developed in three floors above ground, freeing at the back (West), a green space which is in direct relation with the social spaces of the house.
Access / Outdoor Spaces
The building is focused on the alignments with the adjacent house, with a East/West orientation, which allows to free part of the lot at East as a reception and decompression space, providing an area for two parking spaces inside the lot.
There’s a longitudinal corridor, delimited by the contiguous lots’ walls, with the introduction of a single vegetable element – a tree – allowing the automobile and pedestrian access to the interior of the housing. It’s also considered the interest in maintaining the permeability of the soil by applying a large green surface at the back of the house. This will allow the infiltration of a significant percentage of rainwater and the optimisation of the access to the infrastructure network derived from extensions installed on the public road.
Functional Structure
The access to the interior of the house is made by a small and slightly inclined ramp, which is also use as a common distribution atrium of the automobile and pedestrian access.
At the ground floor level are the social spaces of the house. Through a central corridor, which serves as the house’s entrance hall, it’s made the distribution to the different spaces of the house. On the left side of the hallway are the kitchen and clothing treatment areas, accessed laterally. In front is the living room, a big space that establishes a close relationship with the exterior, through the use of a garden. Finally, on right side of the corridor are the staircases for the upper floors – the private spaces of the house.
Reaching the first floor through the distribution staircase, located on the right side of the house’s main access, we’ve got two bedrooms equipped with their own private bathroom and closet. Both bedrooms are naturally lit through the openings located on the East and West facades, having been also created a small outdoor garden to canalise natural light and ventilation of the bathrooms of both bedrooms.
The second floor consists on a single space – the third bedroom and a bathroom. Both spaces enjoy natural light and a strong relationship with a terrace facing the West, where a tree coming from the garden on the lower floor emerges.
A dramatic oak staircase with a sweeping handrail connects the five storeys of this Victorian convent building in south London, which has been converted into four homes by John Smart Architects (+ slideshow).
The Old St John’s Convent and Orchard was renovated by London firm John Smart Architects to create four five-storey properties that retain the original order of the facades while adding modern interventions and overhauling the interiors.
“The distinctive Victorian skin was largely renovated and reinstated to retain as much of the character of the original convent as possible,” the architects told Dezeen.
“New interventions remained largely hidden where possible on the front facing facade, whereas the back facade required opening up to benefit from the south facing aspect and to improve visual connections with the large gardens,” they added.
Extensions to two of the properties incorporate large windows and Juliet balconies looking out onto the garden, and are clad in pale limestone that contrasts with the existing facade.
“Moleanos limestone was chosen as a pure, unapologetically modern solid element which contrasted against the original London brick,” said the architects.
Inside one of the extensions, a double-height void rises from the lower ground floor kitchen and dining area to a reading room above that features a glass balustrade to retain views of the garden.
The kitchen floor is made from polished screed, while oak was used for built-in cabinetry and an adjoining partition that screens the utility area.
A fluid oak staircase at the centre of the house was constructed from staves with standardised sections and assembled on-site. The wood was exposed to ammonia fumes to darken its colour.
Just two types of wedge-shaped staves were used to build the inner and outer curves that form the handrail and the stringer supporting the treads.
“The stairwell concept was to design a heavy vertical sculptured element, providing a solid core to the overall programmatic framing of the house,” the architects explained. “The building’s history meant it felt appropriate for the staircase to have a strong robust presence, which suggested dark oak.”
On the original main floor of the convent, a large oak bookcase acts as a dividing wall between a living area and the staircase.
The bookcase is constructed from the same fumed oak as the staircase, creating visual consistency between these two vertical elements while contrasting with the pale herringbone wooden floor.
Bedrooms and bathrooms are contained on the second and third storeys, with the staircase continuing to a roof terrace fitted between two sections of the sloping roof.
Set within a tree lined neighbourhood in South London; a distinctive local landmark has been attentively refurbished and crafted into four elegant houses. The Old St John’s Convent and Orchard at 17 Grove Park has been given a fresh lease of life through combining the rich history of the original Victorian building with new contemporary spaces and interventions. Each house is set over 5 floors and spans over 4000 square feet.
The Great Room Floor
Conceived as an open single space, the Great Room Floor provides three distinct areas within the original ground floor of the convent, whilst still maintaining an open dialogue across the floor.
Library
The oak library unit forms a central ‘furniture wall’ in the Great Room. Concealed full height doors allow space to flow freely around it, creating a fluid space. The fumed oak joinery relates to the fumed oak stair, bringing the verticality of the central core into the spatial dynamic.
Staircase Design
The five-storey oak stair is constructed using staves of standard section sizes that were laminated into a bespoke form. Crafted in a workshop, the elements were assembled on-site into a seamless flight that rises through the core of the house. Detailing is reduced to a minimum – just two types of wedged-shaped staves were used to achieve the inner and outer curves of the stair, which serves as both stringer and handrail.
Kitchen and Dining
At the heart of each house is a cooking and dining space situated under a dramatic six-metre high double height void. Framed by a full height oak window and sliding door, it has vistas onto the gardens and terrace beyond. Inside merges with outside, giving a garden backdrop to cooking, eating and entertaining in one light-filled room. The double aspect space can be used to create two distinct atmospheres if desired, each with their own ambiance, for casual family dining and more structured formal dining. A monolithic polished screed floor unifies the space while storage and utility are concealed neatly behind bespoke cupboards and timber clad walls. The kitchen itself is crafted from fumed oak with framed black granite oak doors and an Italian white marble worktop.
The three-layered facade of this riverside house in Tsukubamirai, Japan, was intended by local studio Kichi Architectural Design to reference rippling water (+ slideshow).
Named Ripple, the three-storey family home has a blank white facade comprising three windowless walls, which incrementally increase in size. Once conceals a balcony, while another screens the house’s entrance.
“The facade which consists of three white outer walls, is suggestive of triple ripples on the surface of the river,” said Naoyuki Kikkawa, architect and co-founder of Kichi Architectural Design.
The house is set back from the nearby river and is surrounded by cherry blossom trees, which the architect says are typical of this area.
“It is a house that enables its residents to live closely with the cherry trees which manifest all kinds of expressions with the changing of the seasons in Japan,” he said.
The house has a long and narrow plan, with a semi-enclosed courtyard at its centre and a sheltered patio at the back.
Unlike the austere street facade, the rear elevation is fully glazed to bring light into the building and offer residents views out towards the river.
“Based on the shape of the site, one that stretches in a narrow strip toward the cherry trees, I conceived the shape of the house, a U-shaped one, so that every one of its rooms would fully benefit from the light,” said Kikkawa.
The house’s living, dining and kitchen areas occupy one room at the rear of the house. A void in the floorplate overhead creates a double-height space along one edge, while the sheltered patio provides an outdoor dining area.
A lightweight steel staircase leads up to bedrooms and bathrooms on the first floor, then continues up to one of two lofts on the level above.
The second loft sits above the children’s bedroom at the front of the house and can be accessed via a pair two ladders. Glass doors also open the space out to the balcony in front.
This Berlin townhouse by architecture office XTH-Berlin features doors that open like drawbridges, sloping floors that function as slides and nets that cover holes in the floors (+ slideshow).
XTH-Berlin inserted staggered floors throughout the building’s 12-metre height to accommodate various living spaces, with bedrooms housed in slanted concrete volumes at the first and third levels featuring flaps that can be used to slide from one level to the next.
The house’s entrance contains wardrobes, a bathroom and a spare room that can be hidden by drawing a full-height curtain, while a gap in the ceiling provides a view of the zigzagging levels that ascend to the top of the house.
Two concrete-walled bedrooms situated above the ground floor feature sloping wooden flaps that can be raised to connect these rooms with a platform where the piano sits.
A gap in this platform level allows light and views between the storeys and is covered in netting to create a safe play area.
A staircase leads past the two bedrooms to a living room containing a bathroom that can be cordoned off using a curtain.
The third bedroom is connected to this living area by a gently sloping wooden bridge, while another flight of stairs leads to a reading platform.
A final set of stairs continues to the top floor kitchen and dining room, which opens onto a large terrace.
This open-plan level features a skylight that adds to the natural light entering the space through the full-height glazing.
A minimal palette of materials is used throughout the interior, including concrete, pinewood flooring, steel railings and laminated spruce used for dividing walls, stairs and doors.
The house is located beside a park marking the site of the former Berlin Wall. Entrances on either side of the property lead to a multipurpose space for storing bikes, clothes and shoes.
Here’s a project description from the architects:
Townhouse B14
The house is all about space and light.
Developed by the section it has a continuous space stretching out over the total height (12 mts), length and width of the building: from entrance hall and playing area to a music level to a living room with an open bath to a reading area to the kitchen with terrace.
This open space is zoned by two concrete elements ‘hung’ between the firewalls. They contain the private (bed) rooms. Due to their slants views are possible through the entire house.
Only few materials determine the interior space: fair faced concrete for the solids, plaster for the firewalls, glued-laminated spruce for dividing walls, stairs and doors, and pinewood planks for the floors, besides steel for the railings, glass for the facades and fringes for filtering views and light. Interiors like the shelves and trunks are designed by us.
According to the site along the former wall – the no-man’s land between East and West – now the Berlin Wall Memorial, the house has a severe outside contrasting the coloured balcony houses opposite in the former West.
The house is built on a trapezoid lot of land of 118 m2 with a small garden in the southeast towards a residential path and the wide side of the house to the northwest facing the plain of the Berlin Wall Memorial which is mainly a park. It’s part of a settlement of 16 townhouses, the two neighbouring houses are by XTH-berlin as well.
The nearly all-over glazed facades are structured by steel girders, which span from one dividing wall to the other and take over the cross bracing. Two lines of fringy draperies in front of the ground and second floor provide screen and cover the window frames.
Technically we use a heat pump (pipes going 80 mts into the ground) with panel heating and rainwater tanks in the garden for use in the toilets.
You enter the house from both sides: From the north beneath the concrete solid in an area with wardrobe, bathroom and the building services room. From the south directly in the living space which opens to the very top of the building. This is the level to put the bikes, do handicrafts, play kicker, a spare room and a storage room can be separated by a curtain.
The stairway leading up crosses the first concrete element with two sleeping rooms inside. Few steps up you reach the music area, a gallery with a horizontal net as a fall protection.
The two sleeping rooms can be opened to this area by the use of 2,5m x 1,5m big elevating flaps (which besides to slide and play are used to ventilate the sleeping rooms to the quiet side of the house). Further up you are on top of the first concrete element: Here you find the classic living space with sofa and oven, but also a bathroom included, to partition by curtain.
Via a bridge you enter the second concrete element, containing another sleeping room. The sloped wall is becoming a huge pillow.
Continuing your way up you come to an intermediate level, which is mostly used as a reading area, looking back down you view the small garden on the back side of the house and the memorial park in front.
Another stairway and you reach the highest level on top of the second concrete element: kitchen and dining area, opening to a terrace. A huge roof light (through which the stack-effect ventilates the to a maximum glazed house) lets the midday sun shine deep down on the lower levels.
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