Throughout the house, Curtiss mixed natural materials with industrial ones. Downstairs, fir and cedar wood on the doors and open-joisted ceiling balance the colder, industrial feel of the concrete floor and steel staircase railing. In the dining room, a pendant lamp from RLM Lighting hangs above a table that combines Cherner table legs with a new white laminate top. The yellow chairs are by Tolix.

A custom table surrounded by NET’s Museo chairs and poplar stools provides a space for the Sarmiento Tovo boys, Manuel, 5, and Julián, 3, to play with the toys their mother makes.

Jasper and Maeve take five. One of their requests was for their dad to create a secret door to connect their bedrooms together.

Kate and Gerald relax in the living room.

With the Children’s Table and Children’s Chair, Benjamin Cherner brings streamlined, midcentury design into the playroom or classroom. This table includes a storage compartment that can be used for toys or markers.

Lucinda Stacking Chair from CB2A classic café chair in a slick new color way can be used indoors or out. $69.95

The kids make all the fun they need in their bedroom. Their bunk beds and shelving were bought at Ikea.

While she was pregnant and on maternity leave, Susanna tackled creative D.I.Y. projects to decorate Varpu's room, including stitching these festive cotton flag banners.

A cork seat supported by metal legs pays homage to a bird's nest. Handily, boet means just that in the studio's native Swedish.

The original home was preserved and renovated. In the front bedroom, a small window was replaced with a large painted-steel window seat, a favorite of the residents' grandchildren.

An orange chair and cream ottoman of Risom's design.

Fernando & Humberto Campana, Untitled (children’s chair), 2005 © Estudio Campana, Photo: Fernando Laszlo

Collage, designed by Stephen Ormandy: “The design was influenced by the floating nature of lily pads and the opportunity to combine individual sculptural shapes into a cohesive useful object”.

We'd create a hang-out space by setting up these foldable ash-and-canvas travel chairs by Kaufmann Mercantile on the deck. $98. Photo by James Ransom.

The Premaydena House by Misho+Associates was designed as a "box within a box," in which two interior structures—an open-plan living space and two en suite bedrooms—sit within an exterior envelope. Inspired by the region’s fiery orange lichen and the indigenous waratah shrub’s bright flowers, the colorful exterior panels are made of heavy-duty galvanized steel to guard from Tasmanian winds, which can reach up to 60 miles per hour.

Designer Nanna Ditzel created this teak piece for Denmark-based IDG in 1952. It's signed with an applied metal manufacturer's label on the underside. Read more about the Settee here.

To access a secret play area in the 2 Bar House by Feldman Architecture, children clamber up climbing holds purchased from a local sporting goods store.

Marcel Breuer, No. 302 (1932)

From the The Cherner Chair Company comes these two equisitely-crafted pieces: the Cherner Studio Task Chair ($1049) and the Cherner Studio Desk ($1999 to $2229). In addition to a wide variety of woods, the chair comes in an armless version while the table comes in two different sizes (48 or 60 inches wide).

Chairs made from the seats of a Ferrari BB 512 face the tower’s large window, which overlooks the sea

In February of 2007, two San Francisco art and travel addicts purchased a 3,200-square-foot former Chinese laundry and tooth-powder factory with column-free interiors and a zigzagging sawtooth roof in lower Pacific Heights. They customized a pair of shipping containers to accommodate their collection and reflect their passions, and hired a local company to sandblast the interior to expose the board-formed concrete walls and replace the carpeted floors with Georgia hickory pecan planks to further lengthen the loft and make it look more like a warehouse.

A white lacquer Ligne Roset dining table is joined by a wood bench from Room & Board and bent-plywood Cherner chairs. Baconcube 4 by Cindy Wright hangs on the wall.

The compact living area is just off the kids’ room.

The children’s rooms, which are reserved for family and an extended network of friends, feature more custom Crasset-designed beds set against a vivid blue backdrop, courtesy of the French paint brand Zolpan.

The second bedroom, shared by two young children, offers a private space away from the rest of the home. The owners and architect alike made sure to maintain the apartment’s original features, including the ceiling moldings.

Teague's bedroom.

A desk inside of the the hotel's spacious rooms.

Their parents’ seldom-needed stuff (luggage, winter clothes) is stashed in the higher cabinets. “Believe it or not, we have empty cabinets,” says Nikolova. “There’s space for everything.”

The plastic Kids Adirondack Chair by Loll Designs offers kids a place to recline after playtime.

This dining room features the Cherner Chair alongside a dining room table designed by Benjamin Cherner.

A side chair by Norman Cherner with its back overlooking the golf course.

Four easily assembled pieces of wood join together to create Hans J. Wegner's timeless 1944 Peter's Table and Chair set. In maple or in beech wood, this furniture set can withstand life's knocks.

Homeowner Simon Doonan stands next to the front door. "We have flamboyance, and we’re not inhibited about anything. [Architect] Gray Organschi gave [the house] that intellectual rigor needed to make it beautiful. We were well matched."

The Birch Pavilion sits atop a 14-by-26-foot platform composed of hemlock and pressure-treated timbers. Photo courtesy of Moskow Linn Architects.

Christof Jantzen of Studio Jantzen has conceptualized a temporary classroom to fulfill the need for healthier temporary spaces—that often become permanent—for students. His plan seeks to address issues of flexibility, sustainability, cost effectiveness, and creative construction.