To integrate the former postman’s cottage with the new design, architect David Sheppard added a concrete column adjacent to an existing stone chimney and a new slate chimney “at the heart of the composition.” From this, the roof structure fans out; the small structure now serves as an anteroom.
On an 18th-century farmstead in rural Sweden, two Copenhagen designers handcraft a summerhouse that seamlessly melds the modern and the traditional.
On the outskirts of Austin, Texas, author Chris Brown and his dog Katsu head to the river; the path was once a dumping ground on top of a long-defunct underground oil pipeline. The green roof was conceptualized by John Hart Asher of the Ecosystem Design Group at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin.
The topography proved challenging so the designers elevated the house on piers.
Just like the interior, the outdoor shower is an exercise in reduction and contrast: It’s merely a boulder placed under a showerhead on the side of the building. “If you really strain your eyes, you can see perhaps one other house,” Cheshire says of the vista.
Expansive accordion doors join together in a sharp angle when shut, but when they’re open the crook competely disappears—as does the barrier between outside and in.
"The project is a tribute to the majesty of nature and to the people of Norway," says Schluchtmann, "who not only settled on and cultivated this land, but also have the courage and the taste to add something to these special places that puts the crowning touch on the whole thing."
The house features one master bedroom upstairs, two guest bedrooms, and two separate guest apartments downstairs that Wynants rents out. “Farming has become a very difficult trade. Prices are historically low and agritourism is something invented to give farmers the possibility to have an extra income,” says Wynants, who grows hops on his land. “The formula has had huge success; in the last years the tourism capacity of this area has multiplied many times.”
The master bedroom enjoys views of the city.
The walnut staircase and slide in a Chicago town house leads from the main level to the basement. To protect people on the ride down, a “crash pad” fashioned from a standard gymnastic mat covers the wall at the slide’s base.
Dotted with colorful footholds, a climbing wall covers one side of the home, allowing roof access.
Architect José Roberto Paredes’s crowning achievement is the freestanding concrete roof that wraps around the structure.
According to Gaultier, "My imagination comes from the cinema...I love the idea that nature is capable of trumping concrete."
In Scarpa and Brook' own house, they’ve mounted luminous solar panels in a rusted-steel-beam grid to form a modernist canopy that frames the façade. This imaginative “solar umbrella” hides the household power plant in plain sight, part of an artful composition that includes a hanging screen tied with bristles of industrial brooms.
“There had been two or three primitive cabins on the property in the past, which resulted in a clearing that we utilized for the site,” Joseph Herrin says. “This allowed us to avoid any further tree removal for construction, and provided an opportunity to begin to restore that portion of the property with native landscaping.”
The facade consists of exposed concrete, Galvalume roofing, and cedar or torrefied wood coating. The homes are carefully positioned to keep other structures out of sight.
Though the retreat is clearly meant to afford the solitude writing so often requires, Kathleen reports that "it's very lively. Deer approach, birds bathe. The sun warms my desk and you can hear the rain."
Tucked away on the edge of a small lake surrounded by mountains and topped off with a grass-covered roof, this hunting cabin designed by Snøhetta is made with locally sourced stones. The 376-square-foot prefab mountain hut sleeps up to 21 guests around a central fireplace.
Jaanus Orgusaar's NOA cabin in the Virumaa region of Estonia is currently used as a summer cottage.
Pendant Lamp A 331, Beehive (1953)
These lamps were first introduced as part of Aalto's work on the University of Jyväskylä.
Shown with the simple Drop cap Pendant, the Plumen 001 is the original energy-saving bulb from Plumen. The bulb’s dynamic design mimics the filament found in incandescent bulbs, but its glass, sculptural silhouette makes the bulb look more elegant than traditional bulbs and standard CFLs. The Plumen 001 has a screw fitting that fits into any lamp that accommodates a standard screw bulb.
68 more saves