Along with its durability, concrete requires very little maintenance.

The space is also adorned with timber cladding, as seen on the entry door.

For a cost-conscious 2,000-square-foot renovation located 30 minutes outside of Austin, Texas, architect Nick Deaver took a look around for inspiration. He spied galvanized metal cladding on the region’s sheds and co-opted the inexpensive, resilient material for his own design.

The trip from garage to first floor is through a wood-clad spiral staircase that resembles a giant slatted barrel.

The home’s metal cladding is Pac-Clad, a material typically used for roofs.

The architect covered the exterior in Pac-Clad, a metal roofing material, because it's "cost-effective, durable, maintenance-free, and comes in various colors," says Church.

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

A modular shelf system by Alu provides a more sculptural take on the classic bathroom vanity in this Toronto home.

Alex enjoys a sun-filled breakfast at the built-in dining table and bench, one of many space-saving designs.

Among the first Passive Houses in France, this bamboo-clad farmhouse by the Parisian firm Karawitz Architecture only uses a tenth of the energy a conventionally constructed home does. Photo by Nicholas Calcott.

The exterior is clad in louro gamela,a tropical hardwood.

For the spatially challenged, think vertically: lofted beds make every inch count.

Landscape architect Tait Moring installed pavers around the structure’s perimeter and kept the tree cover intact. Photo by: Kimberly Davis

This home's open kitchen, living, and dining area includes a small pantry and an office, but the cedar cladding is the showstopper.

The metal cladding, inspired by a nearby zinc mine, continues seamlessly onto the house’s roof for a minimalist shed effect. “The drip edge turns to make the wall,” explains architect Brandon Pace, “but changes above the window to accommodate a downspout. Any place where the metal contacts glass, or where you walk underneath, we have an internal gutter.”

“The house turns its back to the street while opening up to the views to the northeast through a large glazed corner window system,” Hutchison says. One-by-four and one-by-six inch cedar siding, which were pre-stained in Cabot Semi-Transparent Black, were placed vertically and horizontally on the exterior as a subtle detail.

Churtichaga and de la Quadra-Salcedo purchased a parcel of former farmland to build their vacation home twelve years ago but only recently completed the house—a timber-clad minimalist structure expertly designed to disappear into the scenic landscape.

Architects Joan Soranno and John Cook of HGA developed five site-specific cabins that tread lightly on the land at Marlboro College in rural Vermont. These deceptively simple structures update the regional vernacular. Every year, Marlboro College hosts the Marlboro Music Festival in which classical musicians join together to hone their craft. These cabins help support the musicians that live, work, and rehearse together.

Architect Andrew Simpson and the owners wanted to keep the design simple and grounded with “a sense of modest honesty.” In terms of the exterior, “as much of the existing cedar cladding as possible was retained and reused.”

In the master bathroom, Chris clad the tub and walls in Carrara marble. An AJ Wall sconce by Arne Jacobsen for Louis Poulsen sheds some light on bathtub reading.

When the Casali family gave Michael Krus and Prishram Jain of TACT Architecture free rein to work with unconventional materials, the architects responded by creating a geometric 4,300-square-foot smart home encased in aluminum panels by Agway Metals. The front facade features Cor-Ten steel fabricated by Praxy Cladding.

The home, clad in natural Australian timber, enjoys a sense of lightness thanks to slender columns that let it float over the dunes. The driveway and entry, at the rear of the building, have an understated design to build to the interior's magnificent ocean views. Firm director Phil Snowdon explains, “By creating an architectural form that draws your eye and leads you up the steep driveway, we could engage new visitors in a welcoming process that first reveals the object and then slowly reveals the main event, being the view."

European baroque architecture, especially the Gesù Nuovo in Naples, is closely referenced in the diamond cladding pattern of the zinc. This connection plays into Blake’s interest in “how buildings become vessels for cultural meaning.” Although the theme of continental influence on Scottish architecture punctuates the design, Blake emphasizes the pure and joyous nature of the structure. “In some ways it’s a serious building about architecture, but it is also just meant to look pretty, glisten in the sunlight, talk to the water, and just feel right.”

The tiny budget still allowed room for some strategic splurges, such as the vivid green Verde Ming marble in the house’s only bathroom

Protected by an overhang, and floating above ground level, this tertiary space is known in traditional homes as the "engawa." To sustain a unified look throughout, the floor and ceiling are clad in ipe wood.

Architect Jesse Garlick’s rural Washington vacation home references its rugged surroundings. The steel cladding has developed a patina similar to the ochre-red color of bedrock found in the area.

Architects Alice Fung and Michael Blatt designed their own home in Los Angeles, complete with a modern fireplace design clad in galvanized steel.

“Durability drove the selection of metal panels,” Schaer says of the home’s industrial exterior. Manufactured by AEP SPAN from corrugated cladding, it looks like zinc but costs significantly less. It also contrasts nicely with the natural siding and trim. “All of the wood inside and out is Douglas Fir, the predominant wood species in the northwest,” Schaer explains.

A narrow building next to the main structure houses storage and an outdoor kitchen.

The residence is set back a few feet from the site’s edge, allowing more light to flood into neighbors’ windows and leaving space for trees. “The idea was to make a strong gesture to incorporate ideas of openness,” Lynch explains. “It’s not just a box if you look at it closely. It’s a series of planes that fit together."

Alex devised a system that takes advantage of ocean views while protecting the cottage from that same northeasterly orientation. The large windows and doors can be shuttered with corrugated aluminum panels.

The view from Bruce's cabin is a sight for sore eyes. One of the outermost inhabited islands on the American eastern seaboard, Criehaven (technically Ragged Island) is located 20 miles off the Maine coast and one mile south of Matinicus Island.

Reinforced concrete stands behind the stone facade to provide insulation. Vanotti wanted to focus this project on the simple materials of concrete, natural larch, iron, and wood.

Unlike its next-door neighbor, R-House, TED wasn’t originally planned to meet the exacting Passive House standard. The building’s green bona fides came largely from four roof-mounted thermal solar panels and a 120-gallon water storage tank that architect Tim McDonald attests would have met nearly all of the home’s heat and hot-water needs. After submitting the proposal, though, he completed a course in the Passive House standard. Inspired, McDonald modified the original approach, ditching the tank and thermal panels in favor of a highly insulated, airtight envelope—the equivalent, he says, of shielding the house from the harsh Syracuse winter with a fur coat instead of a windbreaker.

“Considering all of the foot traffic around their property, [the owners] made it very clear that they wanted to find a way to maintain as much privacy in the home as possible,” architect Chad Mitchell says of this Denver home. “Thus, the main floor of the home is elevated from the sidewalk by about six feet.” The exterior siding is red cedar with a custom Sherwin-Williams stain.