Architect Alex Gil and his wife, Claudia DeSimio, affixed a 750-square-foot addition to the roof of a 19th-century Williamsburg townhouse, transforming their cramped third-floor apartment into a modern duplex. The original fireplace remains, but has been stripped down to exposed brick, as have the surrounding walls, creating an almost wainscot-like design of exposed brick with flat white drywall above.

The courtyard is just one of many open spaces that will be highly utilized—in the non-winter months anyway. Concrete worked well with developing the language of FlatPak. The second level is a wood panel that can be clad in corrugated metal or cedar—different layers that can be plugged in like covers on your cellphone.

The design of Brooklyn's historical brownstones heavily influenced the three newly constructed duplexes on Pacific Street.

The duplex residences of the Pacific Street project in Brooklyn, New York, were designed to reduce the environmental footprint by using 35% less energy than standard construction models.

BKLYN DESIGNS is an annual celebration of Brooklyn's makers, architects, and designers. The show will take place May 8-10, 2015, at the Brooklyn Expo Center.

To most eyes, Ezequiel Farca’s 1970s-style concrete home in Mexico City looked like a teardown. Even the lot itself—shallow and crammed against a steep hillside—wasn’t particularly alluring. But Farca saw through all the restraints to create a spa-like refuge in one of the world’s most energetic cities. "It’s is such a hectic place. You’re bombarded by so much information the moment you step into the streets," says Farca, who first gained prominence as a furniture and interior designer. "So we envisioned this house as a retreat, a kind of a temple." The rooftop courtyard is lined with a verdant mix of indigenous plants, including banana trees, palm trees, lion’s claw, Mexican breadfruit, and native vines. The chaise longues were designed for Farca’s EF Collection.

In the outdoor dining room, wire chairs by Harry Bertoia for Knoll surround a mango wood table made by a local carpenter, Diego Madrazo.

Here's the kids' room.

The sleek kitchen looks down on the main living space.

The owners of this 2,400-square-foot space inside the Flower Box Apartments enlisted John Handley and Melissa Baker of Pulltab Design to recast it as a garden-themed abode. The striking windows overlooking East 7th Street were additions by the architects.

The duplex’s lower level, formerly a railroad apartment, was conjoined with its neighbor and reconfigured to meet the rooftop addition.

Get the whole family involved in the kitchen, whether it be teaching young ones a tried-and-true recipe or exploring a new dish together.

Known for furniture and interior design, Ezequiel Farca transformed a 1970s-style concrete home in Mexico City into a tranquil sanctuary. The temple-like retreat blends into the hilly Lomas de Chapultepec neighborhood with its pale gray-green hue and strategic plantings, which soften the boundaries between house, garden, and street. The Recinto lava stone patio accessed through the living room holds teak outdoor furniture designed by Farca himself.

Gaffney's cousin lives in the house just in front. To give a bit of perspective, this photo was likely taken just feet in front of the waist-high wall that runs between the two houses's yards.

A familiar scene in the Benoit home: Peter paints at the Steelcase desk—"I do all my work here," he says—while Ando sits nearby, waiting for attention.

"The longer I work as an architect, the more I want to deepen my skills as a gardener," says Yuri Zagorin Alazraki, founder of the Mexico City firm ZD+A. In building his own house in Mexico City’s Lomas de Chapultepec neighborhood, his commitment has produced results that appear miraculous. In fact, they grow out of a carefully choreographed series of bravura design moves.

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.

An Almond bathtub by Porcelanosa is accented by a tub filler from Hansgrohe.

The stairs leading from the great room to the backyard.

The guest bedroom.

Lindsey Adelman designed the lights dangling above the great room.

A main goal of the remodel was to open the apartment by raising the ceilings. The owners were surprised with how much space they had to work with. The kitchen blends in seamlessly with the living room on one side and the open terrace on the other.

Here's one of the bedrooms.

On the main floor there are eleven windows with exposures on the south, west, and east. (They already existed in the space pre-renovation.) Well-hidden storage occupies the space below the windows. There's also more storage behind no-hardware doors on the lower floor, creating a clean, streamlined look.

Massive sliding glass doors look lead to a large outdoor space.

Margarita McGrath and Scott Oliver of Noroof Architects termed the 1,650-square-foot house in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, “Pushmi-Pullyu,” in reference to the interior-exterior flow they created. Resident Jill Magid, pictured on her front steps with son Linus, is a conceptual artist; she fabricated the neon house numbers.

In an effort to create an abundance of light and air flow throughout the space, the home follows an L-shaped floor plan that wraps around outdoor areas. “We designed several open spaces, each with a different feel: the garden and pool, the terrace, and the back patio,” says Cesarman. “The idea was to reduce the area to the most basic and essential [elements].”

Darcy Miro and her son, Lucien, enjoy a moment in their new double-height living room. The Charlotte Perriand wall sconces are vintage finds.

A good dose of inspiration from Luis Barragán turned a dark and beleaguered midcentury house into a family home for the ages. The paint colors chosen by the residents and architect Linda Taalman are American Cheese and Blushing Bride, both by Benjamin Moore, creating a tapestry of color and texture.

The back of the house has sliding doors that open far enough to expose the entire livingroom to the families' back yard.

Judith and Maple at work in the living space, which has a deck off the side and a view of the neighbors' house.

The former workman’s cottage had undergone dated renovations.

Solid European oak flooring by DuChateau runs throughout the home. The sculpture is by Jorge Yázpik.