Owner Stacey Hill was instantly drawn to this shipping container’s existing blue color and chose to leave it unchanged. Architect Jim Poteet added floor-to-ceiling sliding doors to allow light in, as well as a cantilevered overhang to shade a window on the left side, which houses a small garden storage area.
Holiday center, Hal Yalta, 1984
For this project, the husband loved ultra-modern design, while the wife leaned towards a more traditional aesthetic. How to please both? “Through the design process, we learned that their tastes were actually more closely aligned when we focused on the desired 'feel' of the home versus specific design details,” Field says.
He and his colleagues balanced rustic, exposed ceiling beams with elegant venetian plaster walls, and artful aluminum storefront windows with functional white oak plank flooring.
Brandt explains the decision to allow guests to glimpse Muuto's inner workings: "You can see that we are concentrated and producing. It reassures you that we deliver good solutions and come up with a great combination of products."
Renovating the old mill was a family effort, and Blee called on his sister Kate, a textile designer based in London, to lend a helping hand with the tile work. Kate's repertoire also extends to building installations, including a ceramic wall in the City and Islington Center for Lifelong Learning in North London. "She had several boxes left over," Blee recalls, "which meant another opportunity to use something that was lying around." The tiles, with finishes ranging from heavy glazes to matte coats, offered textural variety, which brother and sister used to "play around with the idea of reflection from the roof light."
In the master bath, a dowdy tub was replaced with a standing shower designed by Di Ioia and Bédard and manufactured by Linea P International. The wall and floor tiles are by Ceragres, and the sink, tub, and towel rack are by Aqua Mobilier de Bain.
The renovated bathroom features tiles from Heath Ceramics.
A sculptural freestanding washbasin by Gessi is found in the first-floor powder room. The hex tiles are courtesy of Dear Human.
The master bathroom’s Aquabrass tub is next to a window lined by fumed oak millwork framing a tethered red balloon, displayed for levity.
Husband-and-wife ceramic artists, Dear Human, baked x-shaped decals into store-bought Olympia Tile before arranging them in the kids’ bathroom. The tub is by Bette and the sink, set in a Corian countertop, is by Duravit.
In the tiled master bathroom, the boys get their own sink.
In the bathroom, the architects mounted a Kohler sink on a sloped, custom-slate countertop. Since the stone doesn’t hold up well in water, the architect switched to black mosaic tile in the shower. The faucets are from Cabano’s Century series.