Windows

The screening room and living area is off the kitchen, and opens to the garden.

"We bought very little and made as much as we could,

Derek Gray of Bay West Builders made the entry bench from wood earmarked for an unbuilt breakfast bar. Radiant-heated concrete floors offer a polished counterpoint to the board-formed walls outside.

The design takes advantage of the naturally rising and falling topography to fill its lower level, a kind of non-basement, with natural light.

A painting by Fleur’s mother is displayed on the stair.

Bathed in west-facing light, the master bedroom includes a large window (also created in the shape of the roof) with views of the rear garden.

The raised living room and den beneath it (pictured here) can be converted into a ground-floor bedroom, freeing up the loft above the bathroom for storage or other uses.

By dropping the window sills to the same height as the kitchen counters, Rafael created a cleaner look and brought in more light.

The picture window drops to the floor, so as to make the connection between inside and out more fluid. Kaplan divided the backyard into two sections, with the portion against the window imagined as a “quiet, Zen garden made of sedum,” says the architect.

The wood stove is the Rondo model by Rais.

The large window that punctuates the front facade "is called a flower window in the Netherlands because of its depth; the ledge is a place to put flowers," Collaris says. "In this case, it's an extra place to sit in the living room."

The furniture throughout the summer home is custom made to perfectly fit the compact interior. “Because the space is so small, you have to think of it as like a sailing boat and it has to be as smart as possible,” says architect Line Solgaard. “If we bought furniture it would be too big or take focus away from the architecture. The furniture we designed is integrated into the building.”

In the living room, an antique farm table surrounded by Charlotte Perriand chairs adds an organic element to the streamlined space.