DESIGN

To accommodate busy lifestyles, Bosch prioritizes functionality. Intuitive controls, flush installation, and slam-proof doors ease stress in the hardest working room in the house.

Custom kitchen cabinets designed by Pulltab and fabricated by Maciek Winiarczyk hold mostly vintage ironstone that Geiger has found at flea markets and estate sales over the past 20 years. "I love white," she says, "because I think food always looks better on it." She also collects vintage wooden cutting boards, shown resting against the marble tile backsplash from Stone Source.

A view of the stretching Carrara marble countertop.

THE FUTURE OF KITCHENS Cardenio Petrucci has seen the kitchen assume increasing prominence, to the point where it’s akin to a piece of fine furniture.

Concrete stairs leading up to a sleeping loft are illuminated with wall sconces.

Pros: Concrete countertops are durable, resistant to heat, and can be less expensive than natural stone, especially when completed as a DIY project. Cons: Concrete must be sealed before being used; otherwise, its porous nature means that it will stain very easily.

A minimalist approach to design can make spaces feel thoughtful, bright, and more spacious than they really are—qualities that are paramount to a recent project in Poznań by Polish architecture firm mode:lina. The architects employed several tricks to make the home feel more spacious. Among them, mirrors were installed to visually enlarge the room, and smart storage spaces—even a recessed dog house—were built directly into the home’s walls. “The less visible [storage is], the better,” they say.

Strata Bench for Landscape Forms It's hard to believe this sleek bench was fashioned from concrete. But according to designer Jess Sorel, a proprietary material blend and new molding technique gave him the freedom to play with the material. "I wanted to take the perceptions about what [concrete] should be and counter that," he said. "I wanted to create something with a visual edge and have it float like a cantilever. How do we push concrete so it's not a brutalist chunk of material, but instead something elegant?"

Designed by Zaha Hadid, the neo-futuristic Dongdaemun Design Plaza (DDP) opened in Seoul in 2014. It's home to art and design galleries and a high-design shopping center.

The terrace overlooks a grassy gully and the setback allows lots of natural light. The railing cants inward in a very Hadid touch, one of the few signature moves in the building, which at least on the interior, is quite restrained.

Among the ranking wine architecture is this tasting pavilion designed by Zaha Hadid. R. López de Heredia Viña Tondonia, 2006. Photo by Pepe Franco, courtesy of Viña Tondonia.

Z-Chair, 2011. Zaha Hadid (Iraqi, b. 1950). Stainless steel. 34 5/8 x 24 x 36 1/4 in. Silver. Enrico Suà Ummarino, courtesy of Sawaya & Moroni.

Álvaro Siza's factory building and Zaha Hadid's Fire Station were completed within less than a year of each other (the Fire Station in 1993 and the factory building in 1994). Though Siza's brick building appears simple if not plain, it was designed to look decidedly different than the other structures on campus. Its facade of bricks is unusual as the material is not typically used in southern Germany. The bridge that Siza designed connects his building with Nicholas Grimshaw's factory to the left (completed in 1986) and acts to frame Hadid's Fire Station.

Maxxi Diptychon, Zaha Hadid, 2009, silver gelatin print.

Volu Dining Pavilion by Zaha Hadid and Patrik Schumacher One of the first unveiled designs features curvy wood dining furniture nestled inside a metal structure in the shape of an oversized open clamshell. Backlit by purple-toned LEDs, Volu embodies the sci-fi effect typical of Hadid’s work. Each Volu Dining Pavilion, to be be produced in an edition of 24, will go for $480,000.

Maxxi Diptychon, Zaha Hadid, 2009, silver gelatin print.

Rosenthal Center for Art, Zaha Hadid, 2003, silver gelatin print.

Hadid’s expressive design wraps around the adjacent lounge and invites visitors to relax.

“Every space of the house has a close relationship with the exterior, which creates the sensation of living outdoors with all the comfort and advantages of living indoors,” says architect Atahualpa Hernandez Salazar.