A nice pic of old Alden himself.

Bornstein and his daughter Velma sit at a table the architect designed himself; the dining chairs were designed by Arne Jacobsen for Fritz Hansen.

Almost every element of the interior—from the kitchen cabinetry to the art on the walls—was created by Dollahite himself.

Dollahite tackled landscaping last, installing climate-sensitive plants in metal planters he designed himself.

Jawed Umerani, who did the structural engineering on the house himself, likes to work on blueprints in the front room.

Cho relaxes in the first-floor living room, where paintings by up-and-coming Germany-based Chinese artist Ruo Bing Chen play off a sofa and coffee table designed by the architect himself.

Showing building and landscape

A cement slab and wood deck offer space for meals and stargazing. Sam built the furniture himself.

Resident Brian Whitlock saved some serious cash by taking on much of the construction work himself. By wiring his house himself, he saved around $30,000. “People have a visceral fear of electricity, which is healthy in some ways,” he says. “But I think it gets a bad rap.”

Architect Lorcan O’Herlihy created a residence for himself and his wife, Cornelia, in Venice, California.

On a hillside in Los Angeles, architect Clive Wilkinson created a three-story home for himself, his wife, Elisabeth, and their children.

The stylish staircase provides a strong focus for the open-plan interior, and was constructed out of fir plywood by Duerksen himself.

While Falck built most of the tiny home himself, he hired a local carpenter to build the window frame and door.

Twin houses face off in La Jolla across wide-open walls and decking. The design held such appeal that the architect claimed one 2inn for himself.

Johan built the stairs himself. Marble for the kitchen was sourced from a quarry 10 minutes away, as were the limestone floors.

Steve Conine, a software engineer, installed and programmed many of the details himself, like the Dell UltraSharp flat-screen panels inlaid into the entryway of the home.

A view out from the entrance lobby shows Koch leaving the house. He made the stairs' steel risers himself, with the help of his cousin, Chris Wilson.

The 1930s home in London that architect Grant Straghan remodeled for himself and his family is enlivened by blue-green cement tile exterior cladding.

Ben Koush has amassed a collection of new and vintage furniture that complements the few pieces he designed himself, like side tables and art stands in the living room.

In legendary designer Jens Risom's home, the painted white brick fireplace is flanked by wood bookshelves that join to form a mantle.

The curving white wall in architect Jay Atherton’s bedroom is optimally sited to capture shadows from the redbud tree outside his window. The bed rests on a concrete floor. "It was important that the rooms be pure spaces," says Cy Keener, a carpenter, who helped design and construct the spartan home in Phoenix.

Emilio Fuscaldo sits in the garden outside the brick house that he designed for himself and his partner, Anna Krien, on a small subdivided lot in Coburg, a suburb north of Melbourne, Australia.

Architect Lorcan O’Herlihy created a remarkable residence for himself and his wife, Cornelia, just off Pacific Avenue in Venice, California. Photos by: Misha Gravenor

Just off Pacific Avenue, architect Lorcan O’Herlihy designed this home for himself and his wife with a dark blue façade and dazzling display of colored window.

Architect Craig Steely designed this house for himself, his wife Cathy Liu, a painter, and their son, Zane, that looks out to the Pacific Ocean from a lava flow on the big island of Hawaii.

Emilio Fuscaldo sits in the garden outside the brick house that he designed for himself and his partner, Anna Krien, on a small subdivided lot in Coburg, a suburb north of Melbourne, Australia. Photo by Nic Granleese.

"The brief was to efficiently and cost effectively transform a light-starved weatherboard into an open and modern home with a good connection to the rear garden and a relaxed yet refined feel," says the firm. The owner charred and oiled the shiplapped cypress siding himself.

Architect Tamira Sawatzky used Ikea components—one-inch Lagan butcher block countertops and inexpensive Ekby Lerberg brackets—when designing the bookshelves along the living room wall in the home/studio he designed for himself and his wife in Toronto.

Mack manned his booth with his son, 15-year-old Peter Mack, a budding blacksmith himself.

Built in 1948 and named 'Toyhill' by Wright himself, this Usonian home is considered an artistic masterpiece and shows Wright's early interest in overlapping circular masonry, which would become an innovative and iconic treatment found in his later work—including the Guggenheim Museum.

He is fond of telling the story of a large stone table he bought from an antique dealer. When the deliveryman arrived, his truck couldn’t fit through the gate, so Lolo hauled the table into the courtyard himself, inching it into place over several days.

This photo shows Maynard himself posing near a ping pong table outside the dorm. Photo by Kevin Hui.

In the entrance, a team with the general contracting firm Martha uncovered an abstract mural that Engels painted himself and then plastered over. He also made the geometric door handle. Simon speculates that Engels sourced the marble, found all over the house, from Expo ’58, after the pavilions had been dismantled.

The living room features a sofa constructed by Christopher himself.

"How would a kid draw a house?" architect Per Franson asked himself when designing the Olivero-Reinius family home. The simple prefab structure’s unusual color comes from a traditional source: falu rödfärg, the historic mineral paint that gives the region’s famous barns their red color.

Josh Greene takes it upon himself to pay it forward—whether you leave a 20 percent tip or not.