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Collection by Kelsey Keith

Slat Happy: 8 Louvered Homes

Dwell's aesthetic has been summed up by a few aesthetic traits: flat roofs, glass walls, and wood slats. While that isn't always the case, we do appreciate louvered facades for how they help regulate light and temperature (as well as their clean, minimalist finish).

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Architect Dan Rockhill tackled a tight budget and a steep slope to build a modern Midwest haven for a family in Lawrence, Kansas, who had just $214,000 to spend on design and construction. His biggest flourish was a slatted exterior screen of Cumaru wood that shields the inexpensive metal siding.
Architect Dan Rockhill tackled a tight budget and a steep slope to build a modern Midwest haven for a family in Lawrence, Kansas, who had just $214,000 to spend on design and construction. His biggest flourish was a slatted exterior screen of Cumaru wood that shields the inexpensive metal siding.
Outdoor corridors allow the Worples to walk through the house and across the cove without going inside.
Outdoor corridors allow the Worples to walk through the house and across the cove without going inside.
Budget supplies become modern design gold in this Omaha home. Architect Randy Brown turned to a local hardware store to purchase a collection of standard two-by-four and one-by-two wood slats; he transformed the inexpensive supplies into an installation that separates his youngest son’s room from the communal living area.
Budget supplies become modern design gold in this Omaha home. Architect Randy Brown turned to a local hardware store to purchase a collection of standard two-by-four and one-by-two wood slats; he transformed the inexpensive supplies into an installation that separates his youngest son’s room from the communal living area.
Taking cues from this home's Japanese-influenced slatted screen, Hufft Projects applied a ring of ipe wood around the perimeter of this outdoor fire pit.
Taking cues from this home's Japanese-influenced slatted screen, Hufft Projects applied a ring of ipe wood around the perimeter of this outdoor fire pit.
So instead of the clapboard siding or shingles common in the region, the architects of this house in upstate New York devised a rain screen of Atlantic white cedar that floats four-and-a-half inches off the structure. The clever cover allows the house to breathe, drains away moisture, and conceals the “cheap and hideous foam” covering the house’s multilayered insulation sandwich.
So instead of the clapboard siding or shingles common in the region, the architects of this house in upstate New York devised a rain screen of Atlantic white cedar that floats four-and-a-half inches off the structure. The clever cover allows the house to breathe, drains away moisture, and conceals the “cheap and hideous foam” covering the house’s multilayered insulation sandwich.
Carpenter poses outside his house, which is shoehorned into a tiny nonconforming lot among a block’s worth of older row houses and a derelict public park.
Carpenter poses outside his house, which is shoehorned into a tiny nonconforming lot among a block’s worth of older row houses and a derelict public park.