To push the public's idea of what letterpress printing can look like, this year they displayed large fantasy animal prints by local artist Donna Solovei on archival-quality bamboo paper. They were a big hit with teenagers on Friday, when students visit the Design Indaba Expo en masse. Adults continue to prefer more realistic designs, such as the new Sugarbird cards. The Letterpress Company's bestseller for the past few years is a set of six cards of indigenous trees of South Africa (seen here).

The Gregory Residence is a masterclass example in design. Furnished by renowned New Hope woodworker George Nakashima, this private and rustic home offers ingenious versatility over its 1,644 square feet of space on a 10-acre lot.

A. Industrial cranes inspired the Hensen chair by Jos Kranen and Johannes Gille for New Duivendrecht. B. Sjoerd Jonkers uses upcycled cotton castoffs from the textile industry in the hand-crocheted Clew pouffe. C. A runaway success for the manufacturer is the wood, steel, and concrete Barrel lamp designed by Nieuwe Heren.

These letterpress coasters are a collaboration between designer Marion Cage McCollam, a graduate of Columbia University’s School of Architecture who also makes jewelry and home hardware, and painter Jill Moser.

Tom Givone's current weekend abode, nicknamed the Floating Farmhouse, is—so far—his capstone project, a synthesis of personal taste, material experimentation, and historically sensitive restoration: a living laboratory for how to bring the vernacular past into the present.

Overhead cabinets now can be easily swung open for ease of access. The kitchens are priced at IKEA’s usual retails. A 10 by 10 foot kitchen fitted with Sektion cabinets will range from around $1,300 to $2,200, excluding appliances.

An assemblage of best-selling inventory, much of which is produced in small batches by designers and letterpress artisans.

Black and white kitchen tiles add visual interest to this stunning modern kitchen by IKEA.

Lushna's dwellings are available in Europe and the U.S., though for customers in the latter, prices can vary based on shipping costs and taxes. The baseline price of Villa Massive, seen here, is approximately $9,375. The canvas-lined Villa Air's is $4,453. To see Lushna's full range of products, visit their website here!

itHouse, view from court to bathroom.

Architects: Kirsten Murray, Tom Kundig

A tiny outbuilding offers a cozy living space inside a simple shell.

In the office, a Tolomeo desk lamp from Artemide rests on a desk that Stock designed and built in her university days. The Static shelving is by Lundia.

As the facade of a Bates Masi-designed home in Water Mill, New York, rises from eight to 14 feet high, the mahogany planks subtly widen. “It was quite a demand to make of the contractor,” architect Paul Masi says. “But the design was so much about traveling through the site and weaving [the house] together with the deck.”

Fed up with flashy, environmentally insensitive beach homes, architect Gerald Parsonson and his wife, Kate, designed a humble hideaway nestled behind sand dunes along the New Zealand coastline. Crafted in the image of a modest Kiwi bach, their 1,670-square-foot retreat consists of a group of small buildings clad in black-stained pine weatherboards and fiber-cement sheets.

The master bedroom features an unobstructed door-sized opening onto the double-height great room. A pair of Tolomeo classic wall lamps from Artemide hang next to the bed.

The family spends summers and school vacations at the bach. New Zealand's relatively mild winters mean they use the house year-round.

Tanya Wexler and Amy Zimmerman linger in the breezeway designed to draw eyes, and footsteps, from the driveway through the house to the gently sloping backyard and swimming pool beyond.

Kayak in hand, Tom and Will make a break for the beach.

The Aesthetic Union creates posters, business and greeting cards, and other printed matter.

Sugarbird note card by The Letterpress Company-Letterpress stationary hasn't quite had the revival in South Africa as in the US, but the Letterpress Company's creative director Gitanjali Maharaj says that the demand for note cards continues unabated. "We only use imagery of flora and fauna that's endemic to the area. It's all about reflecting where we're based. We don't want the imagery to be clichéd," says Maharaj.

Greer opened in 2005 as a place to display (and sell) the latest in letterpress and screenprinted paper goods.

Yeehaw Mini Trees Letterpress Cards, set of 8, $20 Available at Etsy

Kyle Durrie (Brooklyn, New York) Another of her favorite spaces belonged to Kyle, who converted an old linen truck into a traveling letterpress studio. “She drove around the country for a year in the Type Truck, teaching people how to make prints,” says Hollander. “Every inch of that truck had a purpose and was so well designed, from her bunk to the drawers of type.”

A view across the display island to a breezeway betweent the house and the garage that Pacek and Roynon created as part of their home addition. They use the space for entertaining and food service when the weather cooperates.

A Lakeside Prefab in New Jersey A New Zealand expat and her son use their prefabricated lakeside New Jersey retreat as an outdoorsy counterpoint to city life. Photo by: Mark Mahaney Curious on what was popular last week? Click here!

IKEA chairs join a table from CB2; a Kawneer triple-sliding door opens to the family’s new ipe deck.

The Irwin pool house designed by Landis Gores in 1957 boasts a central room with high ceilings and an unobstructed view of the landscape. In 2005, the Town of New Canaan purchased the property and added exhibition spaces, as well as rooms for lectures and events. The small pavilion also houses an oversized, monumental brick fireplace design that divides the main space from the kitchen area.

The exterior mixes pale gray wood on the vertical volume, and fiber cement and black brick on the horiztonal volume. The three trees in the front yard were maintained during the renovation process.

Gracing the cover of the book is the Hunt house, a Regency townhouse Archer modified with a glass cube out the back.

Using natural materials is one way of bringing nature indoors. Oiled white ash floors and ceilings, along with Italian poplar and Lawson cypress joinery, are found throughout architect Andrew Simpson’s 538-square-foot home outside Wellington, New Zealand.

In the kitchen, the cabinetry is walnut veneer with a weathered finish applied by cabinetmaker David Rogers. “The process involved sanding and rubbing in stain as well as adding a clear finish,” project architect Eero Puurunen says.

Induction cooktops, growing steadily in popularity due to their energy efficiency and speed, are part of the offering as well as as a selection of exhaust hoods.

A 17-foot-tall freestanding play structure that designer Sharon Davis designed for her family in upstate New York can only be entered by climbing taut netting and entering through a trap door. Descending requires sliding down two structural-columns-turned-fire-poles.

A view from a subway car.

Another view from a subway car.