Designed for an artist and entrepreneur client, this guest house features lots of light, access to the outdoors, and an industrial vibe.

"We really love to cook and much of our home life revolves around our kitchen. When we have friends over it’s great to buzz around here; it’s almost like a cooking show. We’re a very equal couple. We wanted the kitchen island to be a single form that we could both use. We can both cook and we can both wash the dishes. The whole thing is really easy to clean as it’s just one main surface that you can wipe down. So the preparation surfaces, the hob [cooktop], and the sink are accessible from both sides. It’s a simple, fun, form-follows-function principle: Store, wash, prepare, cook, eat."

Sunlight streams through formerly boarded-up windows in the living area that was once Madame Wong’s stage. “When we took off the drywall, we realized there were windows in there. So we had more made to match these four,” says Dan. The new windows open up the east side of the building to views of the courtyard below and the San Gabriel mountains in the distance. The apartment is furnished with an eclectic mix of furniture, including an Eero Saarinen womb chair.

We check off the pieces that we have fabricated on the master drawing.

Local sailboat shops wanted thousands to make the 13-by-13-foot curtain that hides the Wall of Storage. "We we called my parents in Bangkok, gave them the dimensions, and they got it made for 150 bucks." says Im.

"We really fell for the building and these fabulous original features—–the elaborate decorative plasterwork ceiling and the tiled floors. Plus we have a big expansive view at the back, which is quite precious in the city—–we overlook a soccer pitch built on former railway tracks."

In a couple’s Mexico City apartment designed by David Levy of Flexform, a Murano chandelier hangs above a marble-topped dining table from the showroom.

Artist and corrective-exercise specialist, Ruth Hiller, moved to Winter Park, Colorado from New York knowing that her home would be glass and steel with wraparound windows. She hopped on the phone with architect Michael Johnson, he drew the sketch, and it took a mere five minutes to decide on the design. The common areas are suspended and cantilevered over the backyard ravine, offering views of a winding mountain creek while also doubling the square footage. A Bathyscafocus by Focus Creations fireplace warms up the modern abode.

The Antonio Citterio walnut-back Morgan chairs are also from Flexform.

Unlike the ornate exterior, there wasn’t much interior detail left to reuse—but the Berniers did their best. Dan says, “There was a wall that had octagonal shapes in it that we took out, and when we rebuilt it, we kept the shapes.”

'If We Build it They Will Come' illustration by Matthew Hollister for The Boston Globe.

LeMae and Vigil extended their environmentalist leanings outdoors. “In landscaping, we thought a lot about low-water and native plants,” LeMae explains. “The lawn we selected needs 50 percent less water than a normal Kentucky bluegrass lawn.”

In our early research phase we started envisioning what we wanted the house to look and feel like both inside and out. We began to cut and paste things we liked.

“We were over the moon at the idea that we were going to live here,” Ogrodnik says.

We then grind the welds smooth with the angle grinder.

We then grind the welds smooth with the angle grinder.

When we first moved in, we found the back courtyard filled with a strange and sad houseplants.

"We installed a lot of ceiling-to-floor glass and connections with the window systems that may have been atypical but so we could include as much glass as possible," says homeowner and architect Matt Loosemore of SUM Design Studio + Architecture. Since the design was not for a client, he says, "We skirted around recommended detailing, but it was for our own use, so we were happy to explore alternatives."

We were really inspired by nature. We’d be on the site and see deer, bugs, even bears. We used survey information to learn about the different species of trees. We'd stop to listen to the rain ricocheting off a leaf. We soaked up the color palette of our surroundings, with the intention of bringing that same feeling into the home we were going to create.

Manz, recommends a 5 mm or 8 mm solid stainless steel countertop for a floating look. The floating look is made possible from a shadowed panel which is placed under the surface approximately 20 mm from the countertop edge.

"We originally proposed using concrete for the walls because we like the plain style and directness," the owners say. Instead of concrete, Smith suggested rammed earth, a material that combines some of the physical properties of concrete, but is less "psychologically cold." The 16-inch-thick walls' thermal mass helps to insulate the interior from heat in the summer and cold in the winter. "Rammed earth is complicated," says Smith, "so have the right expectations, do the research, and hire the right people." David Easton—who Smith calls "The Godfather of Rammed Earth"—headed the contracting team that built the walls.

Here we are building the frame using polystyrene sticks.

Wes Anderson and Jude Law on the set. “We realized pretty quickly there was no way we could do what we needed to do in a real hotel,” says Stockhausen, who worked with Anderson before on Moonrise Kingdom and The Darjeeling Limited. “A real hotel has its own guests, its own thing going on, and there’s no way we can take it over for the amount of time we need to. We couldn’t build the whole thing from scratch, either, we’ll never be able to afford it.”

If you're anything like us, you love New York. Our issue dedicated to the Big Apple looks at tiny apartments, communal living in Brooklyn, and hits all five boroughs. Photo by: David Allee

Once we'd had our introductions we suited up in safety glasses for a glimpse of the factory. Fetching, no?

When we started the search for an architect, we began keeping notebooks of tearsheets of different architects' work. Now that we had hired Olson Kundig Architects, we focused future notebooks on Kundig’s work, making notations on particular details and features we thought would be a good fit for our home.

“Stacey hopes that we can use this as a prototype for a development of artists’ studios someday—we talked about maybe siting several of them together, like an old mobile home park.” The steel sculpture is by San Antonio artist George Shroeder.

What is your everyday bedding? I seem to have a lot of Matteo in my linen closet at the moment.

What’s your favorite brand of towel? Rikumo. Towels by Rikumo, from $8.

Baumann was named the director of the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum in 2013.

We exit the cellar the same way we came in, through the double-height green doors, and ascend to the tasting room.

This amazing beach is the famous Bondi Beach, recommended countless times, including once by Dwell follower @KenCarpenter. We were in Australia in July so we caught part of the Winter Festival. Next to the white tent on the left side of the photo is an ice rink. On the beach (while there were surfers in the water)!

The Plus House—named for the perpendicular trajectories of light and air that pass through on the top and bottom floors—is one in a series of architect-designed homes commissioned by Arkitekthus, a development company founded five years ago with a pledge to improve the quality of prefab architecture. The spruce panels that coat the second-floor exterior will fade in tandem with the zinc-coated steel that rims the glazed windows and doors. "They will go gray like we do," says architect Claesson Koivisto Rune.