Spectacular Dream Homes

Miha hangs out with Kea, the dog, on the wooden deck that extends the living space outdoors.

The spacious living room, filled with vintage furnishings by Harry Bertoia, Paul McCobb, overlooks the heavily wooded site, which adjoins a protected watershed. Photo by: Jason Schmidt

The three structures that make up the James-Robertson residence are framed in black-coated aluminum and steel. Read more about this Australian innovation here.

Photo by Patrick Barta

In the foreground are Float beanbag chairs and poufs from Paola Lenti. Mamagreen sofas nestle near the house on the sun-dappled deck. A 9.5-foot-tall shade cloth curtain seals off the entire length of the house when the couple is away, keeping the heat out of the interior and preventing accidental bird suicides against the floor-to-ceiling glass walls.

This dreamy, glass bedroom by the lake was created as an early prototype for the prefabricated greenhouse/she kits known as the Kekkilä Green Sheds.

The Kelleys furnished the cottage with help from Suzanne’s daughter Betsy Burbank of Betsy Burbank Interiors. Classic modernist icons, such as a Saarinen Womb chair for Knoll, a Herman Miller Eames lounge chair, and an Eileen Grey E1027 side table look at home alongside present-day pieces such as an Encore sofa (which handily folds down into a sleeping surface) from Room & Board and a Doka rug designed and produced by Stephanie Odegard. The Wohlert pendant lights from Louis Poulsen were designed by Vilhelm Wohlert in 1959, but grouped as such, they appear distinctly contemporary.

Behind an unassuming 19th-century facade in Singapore's Joo Chiat neighborhood, Ching Ian and Yang Yeo's renovation of a typical shophouse venerates tradition while looking squarely to the future. Photo by Richard Powers

Surrounded on all sides by a sweeping Canadian hayfield, the 23.2 House is an angular ode to rural life.