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White oak paneling lines the sleeping loft.

The "Tippy Cup Rain Chain" teaches the children about water conservation.

The dining table overlooks the light well at the center of the shelter.

The garden path, lined with potted citrus and towering eucalyptus trees, leads from the carport to the deck and front door.

Clinton Cole, architect, builder, and director at CPlusC Architectural Workshop, gave Welcome to the Jungle House, his family's home in suburban Sydney, the eco-friendly treatment, what with a solar-panel facade, rainwater harvesting, and a rooftop full of fruits and vegetables and a fish pond. Visitors are first ushered into the imposing steel "shroud" entry, facing the timber-clad staircase.

A deep window frame in the living space doubles as a sitting area and harnesses views of the garden and the village church.

A three-story mahogany screen partially veils the backyard retreat designed by Flavin Architects for Ed and Kathy Kelly in Wellesley, Massachusetts. Incorporating a renovated garage, it includes both closed and open spaces and a potted rooftop garden. The garage door is by Garaga and the Exotic Red paint is from Benjamin Moore.

The recessed area in the wooden deck can be used for a fire pit or a vegetable garden.

When building such a modest structure in a large landscape, designer and client often had to defend their vision to their collaborators. “We knew this house was going to be for Maggie and she would live there alone,” designer Lauren Moffitt says. “But people are always projecting for future resale. Putting in the smallest size of anything—to any subcontractor, it’s just not reasonable.”

Floor plan of Centered Home by HYCArch & aalso architecture

Now, the newly exposed brick wall is like a “very raw piece of the old house,” says Jennifer. A preserved window opening marks where the bathroom used to be, and has been overlaid with mesh so that eventually vines can grow over the wall. Being open to the sky means, “a lot of credit goes to the contractor to make it happen, because of the amount of sealing that has to happen for an exterior space to be carved out of a [former] interior space,” says Jennifer. “It was not an easy thing to implement.”

Three brightly colored balconies and an overhanging roof define the home’s front facade.