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Cor-Ten steel fencing encloses a courtyard shared with the main house.

Clad in cypress and charged with color, the North Fork getaway of author Julie Satow and editor Stuart Elliott is something to write home about.

Completed in 2018 on a 2.6-acre site in the San Juan Islands, the two-bedroom modular home was installed in a day.

Set beyond a gated drive, the 35-acre property has a pool, a barn, and an apple orchard, plus a backstory featuring cows, friars, and an owner-builder with a thing for arches.

Blue Sky Building Systems worked with CB Architecture to create a modern home for a family of four in Orinda, California.

"I wanted that natural beauty to be visible throughout the house and easily accessible,

This 2015 property is perched on stilts, and it comes with an ample patio and an open-plan living area wrapped in floor-to-ceiling glass.

Solar panels facing the sunniest part of the home help heat its water and charge its electricity.

Architect Matt Wittman’s upbringing in rural Washington nurtured a respect for functional buildings that worked with their surroundings: a utilitarian perspective that would inform his Seattle-based studio’s modular home system. “While prefab houses are sometimes divorced from their context, Puzzle Prefab can be modified according to each site,” Wittmann says. “This system has the ability to create spaces that can expand or contract for a variety of environments, whether remote, suburban, or urban.”Architect Matt Wittman’s upbringing in rural Washington nurtured a respect for functional buildings that worked with their surroundings: a utilitarian perspective that would inform his Seattle-based studio’s modular home system. “While prefab houses are sometimes divorced from their context, Puzzle Prefab can be modified according to each site,” Wittmann says. “This system has the ability to create spaces that can expand or contract for a variety of environments, whether remote, suburban, or urban.”Architect and Majamaja cofounder Pekka Littow designed a seaside retreat in Finland to showcase the potential of self-sustaining homes. The first cabin was built in 2020, and there are now four along the archipelago outside Helsinki. Prefabricated elements like vertical wood cladding and crisp gables allow the cabins to be dismounted with minimal impact on the landscape.

Woud’s modular sofa provides a vibrant accent color used elsewhere in the house and ADU. The striped club chair is from Ferm Living; the Eames chair and ottoman were among the only things the couple brought with them from Colorado. The knot cushions are by Design House Stockholm, and the prints are by Cornelia Thomsen.

Architect Marc Thorpe designed the contemporary home with crisp lines, a large photovoltaic array, and 25-foot-long deck that cantilevers out into the forest.

Exterior view of the drive through to the interior courtyard, wild flowers beyond

At this summer house in a Danish forest, the cabin's T-shaped plan branches between existing trees.