"It only cost about $48,000 to build, which was incredibly cheap," says Turner of the Stealth Barn. "We got the Timber Frame Company to supply the shell, then we clad it and fitted out the interior and windows ourselves. The idea was to take the archetypal black tar-painted agricultural building and make an almost childlike icon of that."

In 1962, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill architect Arthur Witthoefft won the AIA's highest honor for a home he built in the lush woods of Westchester County. Having fended off a developer's wrecking ball, Todd Goddard and Andrew Mandolene went above and beyond to make this manse mint again.

Architecture firm NADAAA planned a striated addition to a brick neo-Georgian house in Boston with the owners’ primary goal in mind: to engage with the outdoors year-round. The walls of the rear kitchen and living space are virtually all glass, allowing sight lines to the existing gardens and new pool house through a series of framed vignettes onto the backyard landscape. The glass box is bookended by uniform “fins” that mark the edge of each picture window, as shown here. Photo by John Horner.

The second-floor office is housed inside a rounded rectangle of concrete that the architect inserted on top of the old farmhouse.

Their creative confections may ruin our diets, but we’re happy to be their taste testers anytime.

At a fraction of the size of Ochre Barn, Stealth Barn is just one clear shot down the hall from the kitchen to the bedroom. OSB is an even stronger part of the interior here evoking bales of hay.

White was used extensively throughout the addition, a choice that the architects say enhances the spacious feel of the rooms and draws attention to the views.

The glass balustrade and floor were sourced in Germany and installed by James Aiken. Angelique, the founder of Papillon Designs and Landscaping, clustered plantings around the exterior glass addition.

The budget was nearly as tight as the space in this cheerful renovation of a 516-square-foot flat in Bratislava. The centerpiece of Lukáš Kordík’s new kitchen is the cabinetry surrounding the sink, a feat he managed by altering the facing and pulls of an off-the-rack Ikea system. The laminate offers a good punch of blue, and in modernist fashion, Kordík forwent door handles in favor of cutouts. “I wanted the kitchen to be one simple block of color without any additional design,” he says.

Among the first Passive Houses in France, this bamboo-clad farmhouse by the Parisian firm Karawitz Architecture only uses a tenth of the energy a conventionally constructed home does. Photo by Nicholas Calcott.

The bottom floor contains the kitchen and the dining area; the lounge is upstairs. The cabinets are from Ikea, as are the table and chairs, and the child’s Tripp Trapp chair is from Stokke.

Zoe and Jake horse around in their parents’ new master bedroom. Issa says he vaulted the ceiling to fit under the addition’s angular roofline for “spatial impact.” Paint is Extra White by Sherwin-Williams.

Modern bathroom vanities in white bathe the room in light, creating a relaxing atmosphere. Mirroring the kitchen of this home, the bathroom features custom wooden cabinetry and Brodware faucets.

Seen from a distance, the farmhouse has a time-honored quality, though it’s still clearly a product of the 21st century.

BLAIR NICHE PROJECT At just $167 per square foot, this high-design, low-cost barn in rural Wisconsin is an American idyll.

Nicknamed the Floating Farmhouse, this 200-year-old home inspired one former copywriter to delve into architecture as a living. Inside, renovator and owner Tom Givone mixes vintage and industrial decor. Photo by Mark Mahaney.

Designer Sue Macintosh chose the Farrow & Ball Off-Black paint for the master bedroom.

Across from the entrance is the main staircase, which leads to the bedrooms.

The property is comprised of a succession of buildings that extend from the street-facing entrance. The 1,215-square-foot main house is the last of the three.

With a few small changes and regular maintenance, existing buildings are some of the most sustainable around.

Architect Kevin Alter integrated wood from the original bungalow into the kitchen and covered the island in Carrara marble, with an interior clad in wood. A long table extends from the side of the island, and wine storage is integrated into one end of the island. New appliances include a Wolf range, a Broan hood, and a Miele oven and refrigerator. The Fucsia pendant lights are by Achille Castiglioni for Flos.

Sam Shah and Anne Suttles asked architect Kevin Alter to renovate their 1920s bungalow in Austin, Texas, and add an addition, which contains a living area downstairs and an office upstairs. They tucked an office nook under the stairs; the Eames chair is a hand-me-down from Shah’s father.

In this kitchen, an exposed brick wall stands out against the milky smoothness of the marble tile floors.

Cor-Ten steel from a ship building yard clads the new structure, which connects via a glass “bridge” to a rebuilt stone farmhouse containing the bedrooms.

“We really wanted to capture the ruinous quality of this old building rather than do something overtly new,” says Greg Blee, founding partner at Blee Halligan Architects. Before construction could begin, however, he and Halligan had to patch the remaining walls using stones found in the nearby river. Wherever a wall had collapsed, the designers inserted framing to create windows and doors. For the roof, they turned to the original tiles. “My father’s terrible at throwing things away,” Blee says. “We took the tiles off 30 years ago, as it was too dangerous to have them up there. They’ve been sitting in the fields ever since, and this was our last chance to use them.”

In the main bathroom, Art Deco crown molding reminds residents of the house’s past. New fixtures include white laminate cabinets and sinks and faucets by Roger Seller.

McAvoy worked with builder Stephen Campbell on structural elements such as the glass floor and walls.

Located in the bungalow, the master bedroom was updated. On the CB2 Alpine bed are Anichini linens and a Pia Wallén Crux Blanket; Suttles and her mother made the throw pillows. The headboard was crafted from the house’s original wood. The couple repurposed old fruit crates as bedside tables and hung the Hugo Guinness prints.

Architect Andrew McAvoy created an earth-sheltered house in Scotland for Gavin and Angelique Robb and children Scarlett and Gus.

Claire and Ken Stevens approached architect Ko Wibowo to create a modern addition to their 1970s home in Tacoma, Washington. The couple’s needs had changed since Ken was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s a few years ago.

The renovated house is outfitted with a sauna.

From the street, only the main house and one adjoining addition are visible, belying the spacious extension at the back. The architects call this the “Tardis effect,” named for the time machine on Dr. Who that looks much smaller on the outside than it does within.

The couple's house, designed by architect L. Jane Hastings in the early 1970s, is located on a steeply sloped site that backs up to a state park.

In the kitchen area and throughout the home, Mads Odgård, shown here, and Mette Lyng Hansen mixed Odgård’s pieces, such as the Odgård kettle for Raadvad and custom table, with Ikea basics and the Workshop pendant lamp by Louis Poulsen.

Chicago architect Brad Lynch demolished the 1940s bungalow he’d been sharing with his family for nearly two decades, and in its place built a brick-clad structure that would function as a modern counterpoint to its more traditional neighbors.

The bungalow had beautiful bones but some major problems, including a poorly designed addition to the back that had to be removed. In its place, Tribe Studio designed a gray brick box that connects directly to the garden. “The owners love the fact that the extension is compatible with the old part of the house, and is completely different from many renovations of this type, which simply open up the back in a single move,” Tribe says.