The winners of the 2011 Swiss Design Prize were shown in the U.S. for the first time at Dwell on Design. A pair of knitted vessels by Senior Design Factory caught the eye of these passersby.

Delivering a modern look, concrete serves as a long-lasting, hardwearing material.

This "local prefab" home on the Isle of Skye is made mostly from materials sourced in northern Scotland. The timber-framed model, meant to evoke the simple agrarian barns of the area, can be constructed on-site in as little as a day and is designed for affordability.

Heidi Wegener is the director of the Swiss Design Awards.

Black and white kitchen cabinets painted with a triangular pattern add a whimsical touch to this funky kitchen.

Onstage, Design Prize Switzerland representatives Michel Charlot, Beat Karrer (of FluidSolids), and Rolf Senti (of Bagno Sasso Mobili/Swiss Eco Tap) will explain their surprising concepts and how good design can benefit our environment. Pictured, a FluidSolids stool.

More from the Swiss Design Prize booth.

Jaime: Tree Museum in Switzerland Open since 2010 on the grounds of the Enea Garden Design headquarters in Switzerland, the Tree Museum is a unique and rather poetic concept: a collection of 50 specimen trees, many older than 100 years old, in an open-air museum-like setting designed by architect Chad Oppenheim. Blocks of sandstone set off the sculptural tress, and give the whole place a Zen-like atmosphere. Would love to see it in person some day!

Bet you didn't know that Pritzker-Prize winning architect Peter Zumthor studied at Pratt as an exchange student in 1966! Pictured here is one of the architect's most celebrated works, the spa at Therme Vals in Switzerland.

The Peter Zumthor-designed St. Benedict Chapel in Switzerland.

Swissnex’s Sophie Lamparter will appear onstage with Design Prize Switzerland curator Michel Hueter to share more about contemporary Swiss practitioners and their unique perspectives. Dadadum’s Cresta chair will also be on view in a rare U.S. exhibition on our show floor.

When Abbie and Bill Burton hired Marmol Radziner to design their prefab weekend home, their two requests were “simple-simple, replaceable materials,” says Abbie—such as concrete floors (poured offsite in Marmol Radziner's factory) and metal panel siding—and “the ability to be indoors or outdoors with ease.” Deep overhangs provide shade and protection from rain, so the Burtons can leave their doors open year-round and hang out on their 70-foot-long deck even in inclement weather. They visit the house once a month, usually for a week at a time, with Vinnie and Stella, their rescue Bernese Mountain dogs. Their two adult children occasionally join them. The couple hopes to one day retire here.

Nodding to the bay windows so common in San Francisco, the AetherSF shop's second in the stack of three shipping containers cantilevers out over the entry not only to provide a bit of shelter from a rainy night, but also to permit an expansive view of the neighborhood from the second floor lounge.

Last night, January 23rd, Dwell and Aether Apparel teamed up for the Dwell Conversation Prefab's Progress. We were joined by a two architects, a metal fabricator, and a prefab entrepreneur to talk about how prefabricated architecture can solve the problems presented by difficult sites.

Douglas Burnham, principal of Envelope A+D, and designer of the AetherSF shop describes how the trio of shipping containers are connected by just four bolts, making them entirely mobile. Because the buildings at the Proxy are intended to be temporary—San Francisco has designated the lot for mixed-income housing when it has the capacity to build—Burnham and his colleagues faced a difficult site not in terms of topography, but in terms of time.

Seth Krubiner (plaid shirt) and Benjamin Parco (black blazer) describe how they used prefab tools to build a pair of Bay Area Houses. Krubiner is a founder of Simpatico Homes and lives in the firm's prototype house in Emeryville, California. A hybrid site-built and modular system, Simpatico Homes build as much as they can in the factory but as Krubiner argued, certain elements (like the garage) are better done on-site. Parco designed a panelized prefab system for a house high in the Berkeley Hills, too high for a big truck and a crane to move a modular solution to the site.

At just nine feet wide, AetherSF succeeds by being a vertical store. A customized dry-cleaner's conveyor belt hoists tons of jackets tens of feet into the sky, essentially suspending the shop's inventory.

Rather an informal talk, Deputy Editor Aaron Britt (in the tie) moderated a talk about prefab design with (from left) architect Benjamin Parco, Seth Krubiner of Simpatico Homes, architect Douglas Burnham, and metalworker Chris French. Here French describes how his long experience doing custom metalwork allowed him to avoid a trial-and-error approach to the Aether interior.

The library is a collection of art, architecture, design, and photography materials. The essays analyze the system and methods to make the library a publicly accessible resource for interdisciplinary discussion. The art library collection started when it was donated as gift from book collector Daniel Rohner.

Remarkable Swiss Waterfront Villa: Just five minutes outside of Lugano, architect and interior designer Mischa Groh meticulously constructed Villa Cigno. With spectacular views of the lake and Mount San Salvitore, this newly built home is a contemporary masterpiece. Presented by Fontana Sotheby's International Realty.

The concrete wall mimics the slope of the hill outside as a reference to early Maori structures that were dug into the land. The simple kitchen has strandboard cabinetry and an MDF island that conceals a fireplace at one end. The ceramic works on the built-in seat at right are by Raewyn Atkinson and Robyn Lewis.

After living on and studying a woodsy acre of land in North Zealand, Denmark, architect Jesper Brask cleared a stand of pine trees and, from the timber, built a getaway open to its surroundings. The house, which Brask shares with his wife, Lene, and sons, Kristian, Jens, and Niels, is used mainly in summer, when the weather is optimal for throwing open the glass doors.

For 12 years, the Design Prize Switzerland jury has recognized local talent working to advance the design field in their country. Curator Michel Hueter will join us onstage to discuss some of this year’s pieces, which range from running shoes to textiles to furniture and include Etage by Moritz Schmid.

The world’s most popular doll, with a hot-pink blueprint tube and a hard hat: friend or foe to a profession already suffering from a pronounced gender gap?

The HTC Touch Diamond phone designed by Claude Zellweger. It won a 2009 Swiss Design Award.

The stairwell leads to the main dining room and kitchen, where gray plaster and oiled larch wood joinery create a softer environment. The custom dining table, built by GRG Carpenteria, is surrounded by a set of Philippe Stark Toy armchairs.

Mami and Goo the Kishu dog return from a frolic in the forest, which the couple, along with Hideaki, has thinned and trimmed back over many weekends. It’s an idyllic escape and a world away from the concrete expanse of Tokyo.

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.

The renovation of this old stone structure by Wespi de Meuron Romeo architects was, at times, as much archeology as architecture. The small square in front of the building, the only in the village of Scaiano, dates the building, a former brandy distillery fortified with both spiritis and stone walls. After reinforcing the roof and replacing the wood beam floors with concrete, the team started to dig in.

This alternative view of the kitchen and dining area, outfitted with KWC ONO and Sanitär Tröesch, exemplifies how reinforncing the walls and cutting through some of the stone brought significant light into the interior.

Like the stübli, the top-floor bedroom is meant to be moody. Tuckey designed the bed, the brass wall light is by John Glew Architects, and the chair is another piece inherited from the previous owners, a couple who lived there for decades.

The former cellar, now an entrance with a built-in raw steel fireplace, welcomes guests. Plaster outlines the new staircase, where an old stonewall was cut out to provide a passageway to the upper level.

The end goal, a vacation home with a view of the nearby lake, led Jérôme de Meuron to cut through a wall and ceiling to open up the space. "We tried to preserves as much as possible," he says. The addition of the large upper story window adds daylight without altering the street-level character of the stone home.

Despite the raw materials and rocky walls, the upstairs terrace feels positively weightless, offering spectacular views of Lago Maggiore.

Parts of the interior still maintain an earthy, subterranean atmosphere. Catacombs are hidden below the finished rooms above. The stairs lead to an outdoor area designed for communal interaction.

Dramatic floor lighting on this glass wall, custom fit within the curve of a carved-out stone wall, provides simple beauty in material contrast. "In such small spaces, it's often better to integrate the furniture and fixtures into the room," says de Meuron.