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      TS-H_01 by Tom Strala is a pared-back family home on a Swiss hillside

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      Architect Tom Strala has completed TS-H_01, a minimal family home just outside of Bern, Switzerland that includes separate living quarters for parents and children.TS-H_01 perches on a grassy slope in the municipality of Kirchdorf and is occupied by a couple with two daughters and a son.
      Local architect Tom Strala has designed the house to offer a “contemporary form of cohabitation” where parents and children can easily live side by side.

      “I always aim to create a tailor-made suit for my clients,” Strala told Dezeen.

      “My approach is to first understand how my clients live, what their inner dynamic is and what’s important to them on a daily basis,” he continued. “With that knowledge, we together developed a concept that naturally became pragmatic-poetic.”

      The architect also wanted TS-H_01 to emulate the easy-going internal layout of his own home in Werkbundsiedlung Neubühl, a housing complex in Zurich that was built by a collective of Swiss architects between 1930-32.
      “Spaces in Werkbundsiedlung Neubühl are not big but they are shaped in such a way that you never feel limited; it was built 90 years ago and I tried to translate this quality into our time.”

      The children’s sleeping quarters have been allocated to the home’s lower-ground floor.
      Strala specifically wanted to contradict the arrangement of a typical family home, which he thinks are too-often organised in a way where “youngsters are either protected, guarded or spied on by their parents”.

      Each bedroom has two doors, one that grants access to the garden and another that leads to the children’s private lounge area.
      “Whether a ‘good child’ or a pubescent teenager, the child decides day after day for itself how strong a connection it wants to form with its family, its siblings or the outside world,” explained Strala.

      Family members can unite on the ground floor of TS-H_01, which accommodates the communal living spaces. This includes a sizeable sitting room fronted by sliding glazed panels that open onto an outdoor terrace.

      Think Architecture creates minimal hilltop house in Zurich

      At the centre of the adjacent kitchen is a chunky white prep counter, while down the side of the room is a sequence of full-height storage cupboards with circular timber-edged handles.
      Two of the cupboards can be pushed back to reveal a hidden doorway to the home’s indoor garage.

      The parents have complete free rein over the attic, which is where their bedroom suite is located.
      “It’s similar to a single loft space,” said Strala. “Even if you are a caring father or mother, you remain a human being with a life of your own.”

      The interior has been minimally finished throughout with raw plaster walls and pale timber floorboards.
      Splashes of colour are offered in the bathroom facilities, where glazed, midnight-blue tiles clad the shower cubicle and window ledge.

      Other pared-back properties in Switzerland include Haus Meister by HDPF, which boasts bare concrete surfaces, and Montebar Villa by JM Architecture, which is exclusively covered in dark grey tiles to resemble “a stone in the landscape”.

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      Casa Atibaia designed to be “ideal modernist jungle home”

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      Creatives Charlotte Taylor and Nicholas Préaud took cues from the modernist architecture of Lina Bo Bardi to dream up these renderings of Casa Atibaia, an imaginary home that hides in a São Paulo forest.In a series of ultra-realistic renderings, the pair have envisioned Casa Atibaia to be nestled amongst the forested banks of the Atibaia river in São Paulo.
      This is the first collaborative project between Préaud, who is co-founder of 3D visualisation practice Ni.acki, and Taylor, who runs Maison de Sable, a studio that works with a range of visual artists to create fictional spaces.

      The imaginary home was informed by Casa de Vidro, or Glass House, which Italian-born Brazilian architect Lina Bo Bardi designed in 1951 for herself and her husband, writer and curator Pietro Maria Bardi.

      Comprising a concrete and glass volume supported by slim pilotis, the house is considered a significant example of Brazilian modernism – an architectural movement that both Taylor and Préaud have come to admire during their careers.

      “Lina Bo Bari has been a huge inspiration for the most part of my career,” Taylor told Dezeen.
      “Discovering Nicholas had an equal passion and excitement towards Brazilian modernism was a perfect match, something we had to explore.”
      “Having lived and studied architecture in Brazil, I was overwhelmed by the presence and national pride around modernist jewels such as Casa de Vidro or Casa das Canoas by Oscar Niemeyer,” continued Préaud.
      “These homes have become landmarks not only for their style and modern construction methods at the time, but also because of the simplicity of the lifestyle they implemented.”

      Like Bo Bardi’s Casa de Vidro, the imaginary Casa Atibaia features a white-concrete framework and expansive glass windows.
      However, instead of pilotis, this house would instead be elevated by huge jagged boulders that jut out from the terrain below.

      Taylor and Préaud’s creation would also be much more sinuous in shape – the river-facing elevation of winding inwards to form a courtyard around a cluster of existing palm trees.
      This courtyard would help loosely separate the private and communal quarters of the home.
      “Lina Bo Bardi’s Casa de Vidro was an inspiration mostly in terms of this ethereal feeling of a delicately suspended home… gentle curves, extended raw concrete slabs and a primal relationship with the elements are our tribute to Brazilian modernism,” the pair explained.

      Some of the boulders propping up the home would pierce through the interior and be adapted into functional elements like bookcases, a bed headboard, or craggy plinths for displaying earth-tone vases.

      Casa Plenaire is an imaginary holiday home for lockdown escapism

      In the living room, a curving cream-coloured sofa is accompanied by a couple of sloping armchairs and a floor lamp with a concertina-fold shade.
      Wooden high-back chairs surround the stone breakfast island in the adjacent kitchen.

      The home would otherwise be dressed with a blend of contemporary and antique decorative pieces, ideally from the likes of French designers like Charlotte Perriand and Pierre Chapo.
      “It would definitely be a dream home for us in another life,” added Taylor and Préaud.

      “Casa Atibaia is a design experiment in which we combined both our impressions and aspirations of the ideal modernist jungle home,” the pair continued.
      “Through this experiment we sought to squeeze out the essence of what Brazilian modernism means to us, blurring the boundaries between inside and out while maintaining a cosy, homey feeling.”

      Charlotte Taylor was one of nine individuals to feature in Dezeen’s roundup of 3D designers, visualisers and image-makers.
      She said the recent rise of dreamy renderings coming from the likes of her and Préaud may be down to the fact that, in light of the global coronavirus lockdowns, the appetite for escapism is “at an all-time high”.
      Earlier this year, in response to the pandemic, Child Studio designed Casa Plenaire – a fictitious seaside villa where those stuck at home could imagine having the “perfect holiday”.

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      YSG carries out tactile overhaul of Budge Over Dover house in Sydney

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      Terracotta brick, aged brass, and aubergine-hued plaster are just some of the materials that interior design studio YSG has included in its revamp of this house in Sydney.The house – nicknamed Budge Over Dover – is located in Dover Heights, a coastal suburb that lies to the east of Sydney.
      Despite the home’s spacious 825-square-metre floor plan, it previously played host to a rabbit-warren of light-starved rooms and poky corridors.

      Local studio YSG was brought on board to create a more “fluid” sense of space across the ground floor and improve the home’s visual connection to its sizeable garden.

      YSG began by knocking down a majority of existing partition walls to form a sweeping living and dining space.

      Surfaces throughout have been loosely rendered with aubergine or toffee-hued Marmorino plaster, forming a discrete backdrop to the studio’s “interplay of polished and raw finishes”.
      “Settings are embellished by tonal and tactile variations that delineate the neutral zones via swathes of colour and surface patinas,” explained the studio.

      At its rear lies a kitchen that boasts black-stained timber cabinetry. It’s anchored by a chunky prep counter, the base of which is crafted from aged brass while its countertop is made from veiny Black Panther marble.
      In front of the countertop is a row of stools upholstered in fluffy cream wool, and an oversized white lantern dangles overhead.
      “Wall sconces and lamps were selected to consciously pool light in areas and brushed velvet tonal depths as opposed to installing integrated ceiling lights,” added the studio.

      The kitchen directly faces onto a lounge area that has a large fawn-coloured sectional sofa dressed with mismatch patterned cushions.
      A breakfast nook has also been created in the corner, with a seating banquette made bespoke to curve in line with the wall.
      Inhabitants can choose to dine here or at the more formal dining table that’s surrounded by tubular-framed chairs with tan leather seats.

      This entire living space has been elevated to sit on an expansive platform covered with handmade terracotta tiles, bringing it in line with the garden patio.
      YSG purposefully used the same tiles to clad the floor of the patio in attempt to “draw the outside in”.

      The project also saw the studio cut back the size of the pool, which used to butt up against the back door, making space for more outdoor furnishings.

      Amber Road uses dark tones to furnish 1906 apartment in Sydney

      Beyond the brick-lined portion of the ground floor is an additional seating area that features the home’s original travertine flooring. Here, a beige sofa perches on a forest-green velvet rug, along with an angular maroon armchair.
      A complementary green-tone painting has also been mounted on the breast of the huge fireplace, which curves out from the wall.

      Upstairs, the studio has continued the rich palette but with “more saturated intensity”.
      The master bedroom has been painted a dark, mossy green shade to draw attention to the impressive ocean views seen from the windows.

      Another bedroom has dusky pink surfaces, brass light fixtures and an opulent natural-stone vanity table.
      Lighter tones are offered in one of the kid’s bedrooms, which has sky-blue walls and whimsical cloud-shaped lamps hanging from the ceiling.

      YSG was established at the beginning of 2020. Prior to this the studio’s founder, Yasmine Saleh Ghoniem, led interior design studio Amber Road alongside her sister, landscape architect Katy Svalbe.
      Previous projects by Amber Road – which has now closed for business – include Polychrome House, a colourful 1960s-era property, and the dark-hued 1906 Apartment – which is owned by the same family who reside in Budge Over Dover.
      Photography is by Prue Ruscoe.

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    • 125 Shares189 Views

      Think Architecture completes Zurich home with lake and vineyard views

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      Swiss practice Think Architecture has created House at a Vineyard, which includes a veranda and sunken courtyard that have vistas across the waters of Lake Zurich.The house is situated in a wildflower-filled meadow that lies beyond a small vineyard near Lake Zurich.
      It was created by Think Architecture for a young family of four who, after showing the practice a few inspirational images from Pinterest, said their key request was that their home was modern and had a simple, symmetrical layout.

      “Though symmetrical villas have long dominated architectural history, in recent decades they have tended to appear only as neoclassical imitations,” said the practice.

      “House at a Vineyard aims to prove that this specific spatial arrangement still has its place and can be translated into a contemporary design.”

      The house comprises a stacked pair of rectilinear volumes, both of which are punctuated with tall recessed windows that offer views of the surrounding landscape.
      A three-metre-wide veranda runs the entire length of the lower volume of the house that boasts herringbone-pattern decked flooring.

      At its centre is a small, sunken courtyard centred by a single tree, which the practice has specifically placed to fall in line with the sequence of reception rooms indoors.
      Cushioned seating runs around the perimeter of the courtyard, allowing the family to relax there during the warm summer months while overlooking the waters of the lake.

      To complement the exterior of the house, which is rendered with pale, off-white plaster, surfaces of the internal living spaces have been washed with lime. Herringbone oak flooring also runs throughout, mirroring the decking on the veranda.

      Think Architecture creates minimal hilltop house in Zurich

      Think Architecture worked alongside Atelier Zurich to develop the aesthetic of the home’s interiors, which have been finished with a few standout decorative elements.

      In the kitchen, the breakfast island is topped with a slab of murky-green marble, while the dining room has a long blood-red table surrounded by cane-back chairs.
      This room is flanked by staircases that lead to the first floor, where blue-grey joinery and wall panelling has been introduced. Several contemporary artworks have also been mounted on the walls.

      Think Architecture was established in 2008 and is co-led by Ralph Brogle and Marco Zbinden.
      This isn’t the only residential project that the practice has completed in its home city of Zurich – last year it created House in a Park, which comprises a series of stone and plaster-lined volumes.
      Photography is by Simone Bossi.

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      KC Design Studio creates moody grey living spaces in basement of Taipei apartment

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      The neglected basement of this apartment in Taipei has been overhauled by KC Design Studio to feature a series of greyscale rooms and an indoor courtyard.The apartment, named House H, is set within a residential block in Taipei’s Shilin district and is occupied by a family of four.
      With the children growing up, the family were starting to feel increasingly constricted in their ground floor apartment, so they approached KC Design Studio to transform the disused basement below into additional living quarters.

      The basement presented some significant problems – as the apartment block is sandwiched between two buildings, it would only be possible for the basement to receive natural light from either the front or the back of the plan.

      As the basement had only a few ventilators, there was also poor air circulation.

      To combat this, the studio decided to carve several openings into the basement’s ceiling. One large rectangular opening towards the front of the basement allows sunlight to stream down from the windows on the ground-floor facade.
      This opening also accommodates a staircase that connects the apartment’s two floors.

      An L-shaped opening has then been made in the ceiling at the rear of the basement, topped with gridded metal sheeting so that air can circulate from the ground floor above. The area directly beneath the opening has been fronted with glass to form an indoor courtyard.
      Inside, it’s filled with an array of leafy green plants and a small chinaberry tree.

      The thick foliage acts as a natural privacy screen between the daughter and the son’s bedrooms, which have been relocated to the basement.
      “In the night, the light and shadow of the leaves become the leading role in the space,” explained the studio.

      Elsewhere at basement level is the apartment’s kitchen, living area, laundry room and additional wash facilities.
      The ground floor now largely acts as a master bedroom suite for the parents, complete with its own walk-in-wardrobe. There is also a prayer room for the family at this level.

      A moody colour palette has been applied throughout the home. Walls have been loosely rendered with grey plaster and a majority of the floor has been poured over with concrete.
      Almost all of the lighting fixtures are black, apart from a row of metal pendant lamps that dangle above the dining table. Slate-coloured cabinetry features in the kitchen behind.

      Pink holiday home by KC Design Studio features dedicated cat room

      “We selected different materials but kept them as monochrome as possible to keep it simple and unadorned – in this case, the main thing to perform is light,” the studio told Dezeen.

      KC Design Studio was established in 2012 and is based in Taipei’s Songshan district.
      House H’s dark interiors are a far cry from the studio’s recent whimsical project, Cat’s Pink House – a bubblegum-pink holiday home that includes ladders and a carousel-shaped climbing frame for the owner’s feline companions.
      Photography is by Hey! Cheese.
      Design: KC Design StudioLead designer: Chun-ta, Tsao

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      Black shutters and concrete wall conceal Te Pakeke retreat in New Zealand

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      This holiday home in New Zealand by Fearon Hay Architects hides from neighbouring properties while having uninterrupted views of the mountainous landscape.Te Pakeke house is situated north of the popular resort town Wanaka, surrounded by mountains and looking out across the waters of a vast lake.
      Its owners had tasked Fearon Hay Architects with creating a winter holiday retreat that had the feel of a secluded cabin.

      However, as the site was positioned on the corner of an arterial road, it meant the house would be visible to neighbouring properties and passersby.

      With this in mind, the practice worked to create a series of layers around Te Pakeke that can provide the owners with a sense of privacy.

      An L-shaped concrete wall wraps around the front of the house, obscuring it from view. It also offers protection from chilly prevailing winds.
      Beyond the wall is a gravelled courtyard where inhabitants can sit and relax throughout the day.

      A series of perforated black screens that are each edged with brass have then been made to wrap around the Te Pakeke’s facade.

      House in New Zealand sits on a concrete plinth surrounded by trees

      These can be pushed back concertina-style to open up the interiors to the surrounding landscape – when closed, they almost completely black-out the interior and give a shadowy look to living spaces.

      Inside, the house has been finished with moody concrete walls. Concrete has also been used for elements such as the breakfast island and countertops in the kitchen.
      Textural interest is added by a boxy mirrored volume that conceals laundry facilities. The practice specifically selected a reflective material so that this part of the home would appear to “dissolve” within the interior.

      In a nod to the materiality of traditional cabins, beams of timber have been used to line the house’s ceiling.
      Tree stump-like side tables also appear in the living room, which has a plump grey sofa and metal-frame armchair arranged around a wood burner.

      Fearon Hay Architects was founded in 1998 by Tim Hay and Jeff Fearon. The practice was exclusively based in Auckland, New Zealand until 2018 when they opened a studio in Los Angeles.
      Other residential projects that, like Te Pakeke, benefit from views of New Zealand’s impressive landscape include Kawakawa House by Herbst Architects, which perches on a concrete plinth overlooking a dense canopy of pōhutukawa trees, and Avalanche House by Intuitive Architects, which frames dramatic vistas of a mountain range.
      Photography is by Simon Wilson.

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      Aurora Arquitectos transforms ruined Lisbon building into fun family home

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      A fireman’s pole lets children slide down between floors in this house that Aurora Arquitectos has created in Lisbon, Portugal.The building that the house occupies is nestled along Bartolomeu Dias street, west of central Lisbon.

      Although the structure had fallen into a state of almost complete ruin, it was purchased by a couple who wanted to establish a home where they could live for the foreseeable future and raise their three young children.

      Aurora Arquitectos was tasked with carrying out the residential conversion.

      “This is an upstream project in a time when the city has been gradually emptied from its inhabitants under the pressure of tourism and real estate speculation,” said the practice.
      “This is a project of resistance since it grows from the desire of a family wanting to remain in its own neighbourhood.”

      The original building was two storeys and measured just 60 square metres.
      As Aurora Arquitectos had to reconstruct nearly the entire building, it decided to extend the structure to create three more storeys and an extra 169 square metres of space.
      The new portion of the building has been painted bright white.

      “The family lived for some years in the Netherlands in a typical townhouse, known as a typology that has a vertical distribution of the program, so we can also say that influenced the design process,” the practice explained to Dezeen.

      Aurora Arquitectos opens up 1970s apartment in Lisbon with angular skylights and folding walls

      Inside, the traditional arrangement of rooms has been reversed. The sleeping quarters are on the bottom two floors, while the communal living spaces have been spread across the upper three floors to benefit from views of the nearby Tejo river.

      This excludes the playroom that has been situated at the rear of the ground floor, complete with curving in-built shelves where the kids can display their toys.
      The room can be reached via a fireman’s pole that extends from the kid’s bedroom directly above.

      “The family has three children and they like to spend all their time together, so the option was to concentrate their sleeping area,” added practice.
      “But once they grow up and need separate bedrooms one can transform the playroom into a bedroom, and the pole area into a bathroom.”

      As the playroom faces onto a narrow lane often frequented by pedestrians, the rear elevation of the home has been fitted with oversized privacy shutters that can be slid across the windows.
      On the home’s front elevation, the practice has simply restored the existing patterned tiles and freshened up the “Lisbon-green” paint that features on the doors.

      Rooms across all levels of the home have timber flooring and white walls, cabinetry and light fixtures. Perforated white metal forms the treads of some of the staircases.
      A splash of colour is provided by a recessed window in the kitchen that the practice refers to as “the green eye” as it is lined with jade-coloured Verde Viana marble.

      On the fifth floor is an outdoor terrace inset in the house’s pitched roof.
      The terrace is backed by a glass wall that looks down to the home’s living room on the fourth floor. Here there is a large window seat where the inhabitants can sit and relax with a book.

      Aurora Arquitectos was established in 2010 by Sofia Couto and Sérgio Antunes.
      The practice has completed a number of other projects around the Portuguese city of Lisbon – others include a brightly-hued hostel that occupies an old family home, and a renovated 1970s apartment that features angular skylights and folding walls.
      Photography is by Do Mal O Menos.
      Project credits:
      Architecture: Aurora ArquitectosArchitecture team: Sérgio Antunes, Sofia Reis Couto, Carolina Rocha, Bruno Pereira, Tânia Sousa, Rui Baltazar, Dora JerbicBuilding supervision: GesconsultEngineering: Zilva, Global, LDAConstruction: Mestre Avelino

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      Ruxton Rise Residence in Melbourne is arranged around a planted courtyard

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      A courtyard dotted with olive trees sits at the heart of this grey-brick home in Melbourne that Studio Four has created for its own co-director.Ruxton Rise Residence has been built for Studio Four’s co-director, Sarah Henry, and sits on a greenfield site in Beaumaris – an affluent suburb of Melbourne that’s host to a number of mid-century properties.
      While keeping in mind the mid-century typology, Henry was keen to create a tranquil home where she could spend quality time with her two daughters.

      “Designing for my own family was an opportunity to pare back a home to the bare essentials, and explore what is required for a young family to live minimally and mindfully,” Henry told Dezeen.

      “The house exemplifies the absence of what is not necessary, in both building form and detail,” she continued.
      “If I could summarise the objective for our new house in one sentence, it would be to create a little bit of something precious rather than a lot of something mediocre.”

      All the communal spaces of Ruxton Rise Residence face onto a central open-air courtyard planted with olive trees.
      It’s designed to act as an additional room in the house where inhabitants can gather together to enjoy the sun, or relax alone with a book.

      “Physically the house envelopes the central garden,” explained the studio’s other co-director, Annabelle Berryman.
      “It connects all internal living spaces and the design enables everyone to enjoy the house together, while providing subtle layers of separation and privacy,” she continued.
      “The landscape, and its movement and shadows, provide a calming effect that permeates the whole house.”

      The courtyard is bordered by a series of expansive glazed panels. These can be slid back to access the home’s interior, where the studio has forgone “trends and illusions” and instead applied a palette of simple and natural materials.
      “Our challenge was to design an interior that reflects the integrity of the built fabric and possesses a high level of humility,” said Henry.
      “All materials and building techniques were selected for their honesty, as well as their ability to patina over time, as it is important a house gets more beautiful as it ages.”

      A chunky grey-brick column loosely divides the living area – on one side lies a formal sitting room dressed with a woven rug and a couple of sloping wooden armchairs.
      On the other side is a cosier snug that has a plump navy sofa and a coffee table carved from a solid block of Oregon wood.

      The warmth and tactility of this table encouraged the studio to introduce a wooden dining set in the kitchen – the chairs are by Danish designer Hans J Wegner. Surrounding walls are clad in concrete-bricks, while the cabinetry is pale grey.

      All-white house by Studio Four blends indoor and outdoor spaces

      This austere palette continues through into the sleeping quarters, which are also painted grey. The same concrete bricks have also been used to form the headboard in the master bedroom.

      In the bathrooms, surfaces have been covered with tadelakt – a type of lime-based waterproof plaster often used in Moroccan architecture to make sinks and baths.
      Even the facade of the home, which is slightly set back from the street, has been washed with grey plaster.

      Ruxton Rise Residence is one of several homes that Studio Four has completed in Melbourne.
      Others include Central Park Road Residence, which has cosy interiors inspired by the Danish concept of hygge, and Bourne Road Residence, which has a stark all-white facade.
      Photography is by Shannon Mcgrath.

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