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Traditionally, walls enclose and divide spaces, but in this Queens, New York, apartment, a wall unifies the space—and creates a sort of statement piece of furniture. In 2016, newlyweds Chris Roeveld, a graphic designer, and Lisa Cheng Smith, founder of Brooklyn artisanal shop Yun Hai Taiwanese Pantry, purchased a one-bedroom co-op in the Jackson Heights area. The apartment was standard for the neighborhood, with a massive bedroom and generous proportions throughout, but with plans to grow their family, the couple kept their eye out for a bit more. When a studio apartment next door suddenly went up for sale, the couple decided to purchase it and combine the spaces into a three–bedroom.

Chris met Nicholas and Deirdre McDermott, founders of Future Expansion Architects, through work and tapped the Brooklyn firm to identify ways to merge the two apartments. “The puzzle was determining how we join these two things that were never intended to come together,” says Nicholas. For reference, Chris and Lisa pointed toward old homes found across the Netherlands, where Chris is from, along with domestic alcovess featured in the movies of Japanese filmmaker Yasujirō Ozu.

“They had ambitions and things they wanted to do with the space so we started by planning lots of different arrangements,” Nicholas says. The architects presented Chris and Lisa with a trio of potential solutions, illustrating them all with renderings that detailed how the proposals would look and function. But for one option, they also made a physical model; it showed a multifunctional wall made of custom millwork crafted from white oak. It was an obvious favorite.

“It was so beautiful, convincing, and exciting and I’m sure that it was the scheme they wanted us to pick,” says Chris. “It was clear that out of all the schemes, the millwork wall had the most pure approach.”

A section of the wall that separated Chris and Lisa’s original unit from the add-on apartment was cut to allow the millwork wall to run perpendicular to the original partition and serve as a connection between the two spaces. The wall displays and conceals bookshelves, a record-playing station, a collection of memorabilia, storage space, and a wet bar with a designated area for making tea. Panels slide and fold in various ways to create temporary separations between different areas of the apartment around the wall, like the office and one of the bedrooms. “This idea of flexibility and morphing spaces to create other spaces was kind of a key element,” explains Deirdre. With all the panels open, the wall creates open spaces that flow into one another.

After living with the wall for the last three years, Chris and Lisa are still finding new ways of using it. “I actually think we haven’t explored it enough,” Lisa admits. “It's been very utilitarian for us—and beautiful—but I think there’s an additional aspect of designing what we put into it. The wall gives us quite a lot of flexibility.”

Project Credits:

Architect: Future Expansion Architects / @future_expansion

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