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The open-concept main living area, which connects to the dining room and kitchen, is the residents’ favorite part of the home. Soaring ceilings, black aluminum-clad windows, and Carrara marble floors make this central gathering place feel vast. Warm, natural textures are brought in through the Eames molded plywood chairs, brown Mies van der Rohe Barcelona chairs, and natural wooden slab table on steel legs.

Otto is a handsome complement to the Persian Sarouk rug and Gray’s sophisticated interior design work.

Even the stairs reflect the materials at the heart of the project with their blend of cork, timber, and black against a white backdrop.

Refinished floors and a coat of Benjamin Moore’s Devon Cream helped breathe new life into the space. The original ceiling fixture remains in place.

After: The kitchen’s countertops and backsplash are “all those 1950s-30s enamel card tables,” Geoffrey explains. “That was a decision I made early on; it took me a year and a half to collect them all.” The beams were a great surprise; they were hidden away in the ceiling. The appliances are former Consumer Reports test appliances bought at auction, and the ceiling lights are a custom design, intended to look mid-century.

Blending in with the fiberboard walls, the medium density fiberboard doors in this kitchen hide a pull-out storage system that serves are a kitchen pantry.

Use the same finishing, for example a consistent wood palette, for your kitchen cabinets, walls and ceiling, and the effect is a kitchen than blends in seamlessly with the rest of your home for a cohesive feel.

Who says a bedroom has to be white? Color, like this sunny yellow, is a wise choice.

Tasked by John Powers and Jennifer Bostic with renovating a run-down cottage that was never meant to be lived in year round, Otto Ruano of Lead Studios transformed the space while keeping as much of it intact as possible. Potence lamps by Jean Prouvé illuminate the kitchen and living area. The bifold doors are by Loewen.

There wasn’t enough room for a conventional stairway to the roof deck, so Pratt chose an industrial model from Lapeyre Stair (www.lapeyrestair.com), a New Orleans–based manufacturer. Its alter-nating tread design makes walking up a cinch—even for Beck’s Lab mix, Little Bear. Beck recalls that when he told the company he wanted a stairway for his home, they weren’t interested in selling to him. But he persevered and called back the next day and said he needed it for his warehouse, and the order went right through. Beck became accustomed to the difficulty of categorizing the building as either residential or commercial: Inspectors treated it as a home for some parts of the building code and as a workplace for others.

More adult playthings, like this pair of bikes live under the stairs, whose cutouts break up the plane of plywood and double as peepholes for kids at play.

Even in a country known for its eco-friendly regulations, the JustK house stands out; its triple-glazed windows and geothermal heat exchanger make it as green as it is modern.

Gaffney and Kiku take in the air from the large sliding door bought from Timber Tech Scotland.

The top of the house is dedicated to a dining area and a kitchen outfitted with steel-topped cabinets from Sanwa Company.

The streamlined elm stairwell connects three levels of living space, from the public living areas to the mezzanine, situated to take advantage of city vistas, and the uppermost private quarters.