No whiteware here. In this moody apartment in Berlin, multi-toned charcoal gray subway tiles make up the backsplash, which contrasts with the pop of rosy color on the kitchen cabinets.

Piet Hein Eek's wooden chairs add a touch of color to the monochromatic Amsterdram apartment of Hunter Hindman and Shelby Carr.

The renovation revealed a 30-foot-deep well beneath the bedroom, which the team half-jokingly considered turning into a fish tank. Instead, they opted for a simple bedroom with plenty of built-in storage.

Shibata made the 10-person dining table using $130 sawhorse legs from Maruki Wood Products Company topped with a sheet of birch plywood. A hole in the sliding wall fits over the table, enabling it to be used in both the library and the meeting room. malki.jp A movable wall clad in wainscoting on one side slides along tracks in the dining-room ceiling, dividing the room into a meeting space and a library. The Shiro Simple Modern Pendant lights can be easily removed and reattached after moving the wall. vanilladesign.jp

The street-facing entrance door of the apartment.

In Seattle's rapidly developing South Lake Union neighborhood, the Art Stable is a classic example of urban infill. Built on the site of a former horse stable, the seven-story mixed-use building carries its history into the future with highly adaptable live/work units.

This eye-catching villa in the Netherlands, designed by Next Architects, proves that you can go big and go home as well. While some homes feature hints of color, the Villa van Vijven structure garners well-deserved attention thanks to its warm orange facade that is meant to mimic the tiled rooftops of Holland’s country buildings. The orange of the exterior also carries over into the communal entrance beneath the building, offset by natural elements such as stones adjacent to the entryway.

BSC designed suspended powder-coated and walnut open shelves to demarcate the kitchen from the rest of the living space. The detailing on the cast-iron columns inspired the perforated pattern of the semi-transparent screens.

The old wood floors throughout the open-plan space are painted a dark eggplant. The vintage PP19 armchair is by Hans J. Wegner for PP Møbler. The painting above it is by Ruben Toledo, a friend of Peter Fehrentz, the resident. A trio of Tom Dixon lights hangs over the Pirkka dining table, with bench seating by Ilmari Tapiovaara for Artek. The Berber rug is from Morocco, purchased from the Paris shop Caravane.

Sheer gray curtains by Ulf Moritz for Sahco add to the apartment’s moody atmosphere.

Apartment Therapy window competition, Jaunary 20, 2009.

The new building (at right) utilizes traditional forms and materials, but declares its modernity with asymmetrical windows an an exterior shutter with oversized graphics.

Segal’s urban-infill units (like the Titan shown here) eschew typical features like dysfunctional balconies and underground garages.

Cees, Jacquelien, Jillis, Lucas, and Thijske Noordhoek gather on the lawn; Andy Dochter looks out of the window while his wife Miriam stands on the terrace with sons Thomas and Vincent.

Windows in the laundry room offer a glimpse of the garden.

The sunshine-yellow spiral staircase stands out against the pale tone of the brick facade.

This 450-square-foot apartment includes an origami-like desktop that unfolds to reveal a perforated-steel divider that allows the passage of computer cables hidden inside the office compartment. This transformer-like cabinet helps maximize limited square footage.

Alex Gil and Claudia DeSimio created a duplex in an apartment building where they’d been renting for years in Brooklyn, New York, and set to work gutting the interior and adding a new rooftop addition clad in panels of Cor-Ten steel.

Designer Paola Navone transformed a 200-year-old factory in Umbria into an inviting home for Andrea Falkner-Campi and her husband. Once a tobacco-drying plant, and before that a silkworm farm, the home sits 90 miles north of Rome.

With four levels and five private terraces, the penthouse cantilevers over Beekman Place in Manhattan.

Residents are allowed a small swatch of land to plant gardens.

Inside Out Architecture renovated an apartment in the Clerkenwell section of central London, removing interior walls to create an open, loft-like living space. The architects were taken in by the "dramatic geometry" of the existing board-formed concrete ceiling, and their design maintained and emphasized its dynamic criss-crosses and texture.

An older building doesn't mean that it can't also be modern, particularly in the kitchen.

Home Renovation Tip: Decide on a Sensible Scope of Work

Inspired by skateboards, the swing seats are made of European oak. “At first we tried bigger boards, but you can’t sit on them,” Parzyszek says.

The neutral color palette extends to the kitchen, which is overhung by several pendant globes.

The couple’s white Bulthaup kitchen is set within a double-height volume hung with Tom Dixon Beat lights, arranged in a custom configuration by interior designer Maria Rosa Di Ioia. Overhead, Cubit shelving artfully displays books and objects, accessible by a glass-walled footbridge added during the renovation.

The renovation was designed to preserve and call attention to the angular pattern of the crisscrossing concrete ceiling beams. Photo by Jim Stephenson.

Architects who practice in dense cities know its almost impossible to add square footage to an apartment. Yet at a garden-level residence in Boston's historic Beacon Hill neighborhood, Chris Greenawalt of Bunker Workshop was able to unearth 70 square feet of living space through a little excavation.

This living/dining space is the social center of the apartment. For that reason, the architect designed the cabinet walls as a unifying visual feature that anchors the two rooms and provides practical storage space.

The building, constructed in 1948, was designed by architect A. Rollin Caughey.

In the living room of the Barcelona apartment designer Elina Vila D’Acosta-Calheiros shares with her husband, Ginés Gorriz, Arne Jacobsen Swan chairs join a sofa by Piero Lissoni for Living Divani. The cabinet is from Cappellini, as is the Marcel Wanders Big Shadow lamp.

Once home to a shoe repairer and abandoned for the last two years, Central Hotel & Café received a much-needed makeover from owner Leif Thingtved, who is seen here peering out the one-roomed hotel located above the downstairs café. The single room comes with a bathroom, flat screen television, high-speed internet, Royal Eden bed, and mini bar. Photo by: Martin Kaufmann