Minimalist interior design

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      MWAI designs Mayfair apartment as if it were a hotel suite

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      From a mini-fridge to a folding desk and a concealed make-up mirror, this compact London apartment designed by local firm MWAI features a variety of space-saving solutions.Commissioned by a busy, professional client who works internationally, the architects were asked to transform a 37-square-metre, one-bedroom apartment in a Mayfair mansion block into a minimalist “pied-à-terre”.

      Top image: an open-plan area includes the kitchen, living room and workspace. Above: neutral colours were used throughout
      “We thought accommodating sleeping, living, dining and working in a 37-square-metre apartment while also delivering the feel of a spacious interior was a very challenging brief,” said the practice.
      “We decided we should not look at it like a residential project but rather like a hotel suite, where all functions are carefully and discreetly planned to provide a functional response to business and leisure travelling needs.”

      The apartment’s built-in storage includes a folding desk

      Finished in a palette of natural materials like wood and stone, the apartment features an abundance of bespoke, built-in storage.
      According to MWAI, the main challenge was to maximise the limited amount of useable space in the apartment. Restricted by sloping ceilings, the apartment had a poor existing layout and was in need of renovation.

      Walls in the bedroom are painted grey
      In order to create a more efficient footprint in the London apartment, the practice began by removing and replacing all of the walls, floors and ceilings.
      Particular attention was paid to minimising the footprint of the bathroom and kitchen by placing them into the centre of the plan, sandwiched between the living room and bedroom.

      The bathroom walls are finished in waterproof cement
      A wet room is now accessed from the bedroom, with a pivoting flush door used to separate the rooms.

      Freaks Architecture divides tiny Parisian pied-à-terre with mobile storage unit

      The bathroom walls are clad in a waterproof cement polymer render, providing a textured finish that is enhanced by recessed lighting. Sleek industrial fixtures and sanitaryware were chosen to offset the textured walls.

      The kitchen conceals appliances and features sleek hardware
      To maximise floor space in the kitchen, the architects concealed units and equipment, including a mini-fridge, behind panels in the wall lining.
      A kitchen island accommodates the hob and oven and also doubles as a dining table.

      Light flooring runs throughout the apartment
      A wall of bespoke storage is built into the bedroom, including a make-up cabinet with a concealed mirror and clothes steamer.
      In the living room, custom-made cabinets with an integrated folding desk are installed along one wall and furnishings are kept to a minimum. A simple fireplace made from Vicenza stone acts as a focal point for the space.

      The stone fireplace is a focal point
      Other architecture firms that have created clever, space-saving solutions for compact apartments include Ukrainian firm Ater Architects, which hung curtains in place of walls in a Kyiv flat.
      In Madrid, Spanish studio Husos Arquitectos designed a 46-square-metre plywood-lined apartment that features a vertical garden and sleeping pod.
      Photography is by Billy Bolton.

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      Plantea Estudio casts minimalist Madrid restaurant in shades of beige

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      Spanish firm Plantea Estudio has layered “light and warm” materials such as plywood and chipboard to create the interior of this Madrid street food restaurant.Called Zuppa, the eaterie is located on one of the city centre’s main streets, the Calle de Atocha, and occupies a commercial space that was previously home to an Indian takeaway.

      The informal dining area features steel frame furniture (above) and a central oak table (top image)
      The 127-square-metre restaurant offers a menu of street food and homemade soups, which can be taken to go or eaten inside of a small, informal dining area.
      Plantea Estudio restored the original storefront, which had been altered by the previous owners, and installed bespoke pivoting doors with frames made of plywood and iron, and topped with marble handles.

      Built-in benches are paired with wooden stools and steel tables

      For the interior, the firm said it selected materials in “light and warm tones” to create a feeling of continuity and make the space appear larger.
      Although similar in colouring, the materials were chosen for their different textural qualities, with micro-cement and plywood boards forming the walls and floors while chipboard was used to panel the ceiling.

      Plantea Estudio transforms defunct erotic cinema into contemporary art-nouveau theatre

      “The light from the outside envelops them in such a way, that the limits between one and the other blur and the space is expanded to the maximum,” explained the architects.

      The space is anchored by a large communal table
      In contrast to the soft beige tones of the walls and floors, the studio installed furniture and fittings made from black lacquered steel with “geometric and precise” forms.
      Much of this was designed specifically for the project, including a large communal table made from solid oak and finished with a sanded steel top.
      Placed in the centre of the space, it helps to channel the flow of customers between the two entrance doors.

      High tables in front of the counter feature marble tops
      Two built-in, upholstered benches run along the walls on either side, paired with rows of lacquered steel tables and oak stools.
      In the space beyond, two high tables with a steel base and grey Ruivina marble top sit in front of a serving counter made from these same materials and illuminated through integrated lighting.
      Here, customers can eat their food either standing or seated on one of the bar stools with their oak veneer seats.

      A soap dispenser and marble sink are mounted to the bathroom walls
      “All of these elements are introduced into a space where the floor and walls are finished in the same colour, so it looks like they are ‘floating’ in a warm atmosphere,” Plantea Estudio director Luis Gill told Dezeen.
      “The materials that are touched by hand are kind and solid, always pleasant.”
      The illusion of objects levitating in space is carried through to the toilets, where a marble sink and soap dispenser are suspended from the walls.

      Plantea Estudio built custom plywood doors with marble handles
      The interior’s neutral colour scheme chimes with paint brand Dulux’s choice of colour of the year for 2021 – a “reassuring” earthy beige called Brave Gound.
      Dulux argued that this “elemental” shade reflects “our growing desire to align more with the planet and looking towards the future”.
      Plantea Estudio, which was shortlisted for emerging interior design practice of the year at the 2019 Dezeen Awards, has previously transformed a defunct erotic cinema into an art-nouveau theatre.

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      Frama creates ultra-minimal interiors for Juno the Bakery in Copenhagen

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      Multidisciplinary studio Frama has finished this bakery in Copenhagen with off-white walls and terrazzo floors, allowing the bread loaves and pastries on offer to take centre stage.Juno the Bakery is situated in the city’s Østerbro neighbourhood, taking over the ground floor of a five-storey residential building.

      Top image: the bakery’s entryway. Above: a steel-framed counter features in the service area
      The popular bakery was originally located a couple of doors down in a shop unit that measured just 35 square metres, but staff had come to find it too difficult to work in such constricted conditions.
      This new location – which is a much more generous 120 square metres – has been designed by Frama with an open layout that fosters a “natural dialogue” between customer and staff areas, bringing the art of baking to the forefront.

      A glass box on top of the counter displays baked goods

      “The vision for the new Juno spaces was to create a seamless interlink between the traditional craft of baking and a contemporary culinary experience,” said Frama’s founder, Niels Støyer Christophersen.
      “Having more space to move is something that we’ve all looked forward to for a long time,” added Juno the Bakery’s co-founder, Emil Glaser.
      “Now, in the new space – which has a really thoughtful plan for production and movement – we can all be more efficient and more comfortable. It’s really amazing how much of a difference a few more square meters can make.”

      Customers can gather to eat around a cork and marble dining table
      Inside, the bakery is loosely split into three different zones. Beside the entryway is a service area where customers make their orders. It’s anchored by a steel-framed wooden counter, atop of which is a glass box where bread loaves, buns and Danish pastries are displayed.
      Adjacently lies a seating area, dressed with one of Frama’s Sintra dining tables – featuring a chunky cork base and a slim, round countertop crafted from yellow-tinged marble. Steel versions of the studio’s geometric Triangolo chairs have also been scattered around, along with a couple of strip lights.

      Oak doors inset with glass look through into the baking room
      Full-height oak doors inset with expansive panels of glass allow customers to peek through to the baking room, where goods headed for the oven are kept on silver-metal trolleys.
      The room’s large windows also mean passersby on the street will be able to get a glimpse of the bakers at work.

      Walls in the baking room are clad with limestone tiles
      Walls here have been clad with Mediterranean limestone tiles, unlike in the customer-dedicated areas of the bakery where surfaces have been painted a shade of eggshell white. Grey terrazzo flooring runs throughout.
      “When approaching the project we delved into an in-depth material case study, to understand what could coexist with the crafted baked goods and as well compliment them in tones and textures, according to the many artisanal processes they undergo,” added Christophersen.

      Frama uses neutral tones for Beirut concept store The Slow

      Outdoors, there’s an extra seating area. There are plans to eventually connect the old and new sites of Juno the Bakery, allowing even more room for customers to eat-in.

      The bakery also includes an outdoor dining area
      A minimalist aesthetic permeates all of the furniture pieces, skincare items and interiors created by Frama, which has been established since 2011.
      Other projects by the studio include The Slow, a pared-back concept store in Beirut that features lime-washed walls and concrete display fixtures.

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      Archipelago House by Norm Architects is a minimal family getaway in Sweden

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      Norm Architects has completed Archipelago House, a pine-clad holiday home on the coast of Sweden that’s designed to embody both Scandinavian and Japanese aesthetics.Copenhagen-based practice Norm Architects created Archipelago House, which is located just north of Gothenburg, for a couple and their four children.
      It’s a stone’s throw away from a holiday home that the mother of the family frequented when she was younger.

      Top image: the interior of Archipelago House. Above: the exterior of the home is lined with pine wood

      Archipelago House comprises a quartet of pine-wood volumes that stagger in line with the site’s rocky terrain.
      Each of the volumes features gabled roofs, subtly mimicking the form of the boathouses which appear along the nearby seashore.

      The kitchen features oakwood cabinetry
      “We like to consider the spirit of a place and integrate a new building structure more or less flawlessly into its surroundings,”  partner at Norm Architects Frederik Werner told Dezeen.
      “The building should look natural to the site and put the focus on the beautiful surroundings and the life unfolding in the place rather than the building itself,” he continued.
      “It is important for us that architecture does not feel alien to a site – especially in a place like this where there is a perfectly harmonised small village on the shore with other wooden houses around.”

      At the heart of the floor plan is a double-height lounge
      Inside, the practice has used natural materials to devise a sequence of muted, pared-back living spaces that nod to traditional Scandinavian and Japanese aesthetics.
      Handleless oak cupboards feature in the home’s kitchen, at the centre of which is a jet-black breakfast island with in-built drawers. Stone tiles have then been used to line surfaces in the bathrooms, which have been finished with dark-wood vanity cabinets.

      Furnishings in the lounge were designed by Norm Architects and Karimoku Case Study
      The influence of Japanese design can be observed most clearly in the home’s double-height lounge, which is dressed with furniture that Norm Architects has produced in collaboration with Karimoku Case Study – the sister brand of Japanese manufacturer Karimoku.
      This includes a pebble-grey sofa, stone-topped coffee table and pair of armchairs that boast arching backrests upholstered in creamy fabric.
      Archipelago House is the third project that the brand has worked on since its launch in 2019, joining the Kinuta Terrace apartment block in Tokyo and the Blue Bottle Coffee cafe in Yokohama.

      Japanese lanterns appear throughout the holiday home
      The home’s living area also has a delicate cone-shaped lantern that was created bespoke for the project by Kojima Shouten, a Japanese brand that has been making lanterns for over 230 years.
      Crafted from washi paper, the lantern’s peaked form is meant to act as another reference to the architectural form of Archipelago House.

      Johan Sundberg builds Swedish holiday home that takes cues from Japanese architecture

      More squat lanterns that balance on four-legged stands appear in the home’s tranquil sleeping quarters. Here there are also book-like storage boxes that Norm Architects designed alongside Danish brand August Sandgren, where inhabitants can tuck away their personal trinkets.

      Book-style storage boxes hide the inhabitant’s belongings
      Beyond the home’s dining room lies an expansive outdoor deck where the family can play games or enjoy alfresco dinners with views of the adjacent sea and small, rugged islands.
      “Nature plays an important role in our soft minimalist approach, where we believe that buildings should be a functional backdrop and structure for human engagement,” added Werner.
      “It might be a romantic relationship with nature – but after all, that is why we want to escape the city once in a while and reconnect with nature in our holiday homes.”

      The home includes an outdoor deck
      Norm Architects was established in 2008 by Kasper Rønn Von Lotzbeck and Jonas Bjerre-Poulsen.
      The practice’s Archipelago House joins a number of getaway homes in scenic Sweden – others include Summerhouse Solviken by Johan Sundberg Arkitektur, which is raised up on steel stilts, and Villa Vassdal by Studio Holmberg, which boasts minimal plywood interiors.
      Photography is courtesy of Jonas Bjerre-Poulsen of Norm Architects.

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      Case-Real contrasts plaster and steel inside Aesop store in Shinjuku

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      Coarse plaster walls offset glinting stainless-steel display fixtures in this restrained store that architecture studio Case-Real has designed for Aesop in Shinjuku, Tokyo.The Aesop store occupies a glass-fronted retail unit in Shinjuku, a buzzing, tourist-heavy ward of Tokyo populated with bars, eateries and neon-lit billboards.

      Case-Real used just two materials to create the store’s simple interior
      When it came to designing the store’s interiors, Case-Real wanted to capture both what it describes as a sense of “artificial chaos” that permeates Shinjuku and the natural quality of Aesop’s skincare products.

      The locally based studio decided to use two contrasting materials that it felt reflected the dichotomy of natural and artificial – plaster and steel.

      Plaster covers the store’s walls, while steel has been used for display fixtures
      All of the store’s gently curving walls are coated with coarse beige plaster, which leaves behind a textured surface finish.
      The same plaster has been applied to a section of the store’s facade, creating a simple backdrop for Aesop’s logo.

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      Paint in the same beige hue has been washed across the ceiling and floor.

      A counter where customers can test products is also made from steel
      Shiny stainless steel has then been used to craft a series of lengthy display shelves that bend in line with the walls and several low-lying cabinets where extra stock can be hidden away, complete with steel handles.
      The metal has additionally been used to make the store’s service desk, as well as a long counter inbuilt with round washbasins where customers are invited to test out products or observe demonstrations from staff.
      A border of steel has also been created around the entrance doorway.

      Plaster gives the walls a rough surface finish
      The only other feature that Case-Real has incorporated in the store is a chunky plaster bench seat supported by cylindrical steel legs.
      It has been placed directly in front of a window that looks onto the busy streets of Shinjuku, allowing customers to quietly sit and people-watch.

      Plaster also appears on the store’s facade
      Case-Real was established in the year 2000 and is led by designer Koichi Futatsumata. Four years ago, the studio designed the interiors of another Aesop store in the Japanese city of Sapporo, covering its walls with locally-sourced volcanic stone.
      The studio’s Aesop Shinjuku store is shortlisted in the small retail interior category of this year’s Dezeen Awards. It will compete against projects such as the Pinocchio, a tiny 4.5-metre-wide bakery in Yokohama, and the Glossier pop-up in Seattle, where products are displayed amongst grassy mounds covered in wildflowers.
      Photography is by Daisuke Shima.
      Project credits:
      Design: Koichi Futatusmata, Yuki Onita (Case-Real)Construction: &SLighting plan: BRANCH lighting design (Tatsuki Nakamura)

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      Gonzalez Haase AAS creates minimal interior for Berlin communications office

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      Architecture studio Gonzalez Haase AAS used aluminium and translucent sheets of polycarbonate to create the few fixtures and furnishings that appear inside this sparse Berlin office.The office belongs to trendy communications agency BAM and has been designed by Gonzalez Haase AAS as a celebration of “raw materiality and geometric simplicity”.
      “The raw, minimalistic aesthetic serves as a blank canvas for the agency’s creative projects,” the studio explained.

      Measuring 270 square metres, the office takes over the ground and first floor of a building at the heart of the German capital.

      The spacious lower level has been left open so that the agency can use it for large-scale meetings, or transform into a showroom or gallery-style space for events.

      It’s only interrupted by a floor-to-ceiling sliding partition that can be pulled across to divide the space into two separate rooms when necessary.
      The partition is crafted from four sheets of polycarbonate and has intentionally been positioned to sit slightly diagonally to contrast the sharp right angles that appear elsewhere throughout the space.

      A white flight of stairs with a wire-frame balustrade leads up to the office proper.
      Raw aluminium has been used to craft a series of blocky furnishings at this level, most notably a 22.5-metre-long shelf that extends from one side of the room to the other.
      The shelf incorporates several open and closed storage cupboards, and a bench seat where staff can sit to eat their lunch.

      Aluminium has additionally been used to make the long central work desk and the cabinetry in the small kitchenette.
      Another angled polycarbonate partition appears at this level, but in this instance separates a boardroom.

      “These monumental [aluminium] elements find balance in the large, translucent walls of polycarbonate sheeting,” added the studio.

      Berlin’s Brutalist Silence office has barely anything inside

      Further textual interest is created by the chipped wood and wool acoustic panels that have been staggered across the ceiling. They’re inset with simple strip lights that illuminate work areas below.

      Gonzalez Haase AAS was established in 1999 by Pierre Jorge Gonzalez and Judith Haase.
      The studio often applies a pared-back aesthetic to its projects – last year it completed Tem-plate, a fashion concept store in Lisbon that has been simply finished with white walls, concrete floors and display fixtures clad in crinkled silver metal.

      As well as BAM’s office, other minimal workspaces in Berlin include Brutalist Silence, an office designed by Annabell Kutucu that features exclusively concrete surfaces and only a handful of furniture.
      Photography is by Thomas Meyer.

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      K916 and K907 are a pair of pared-back holiday apartments in Warsaw

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      Boxy timber volumes tuck away the beds and bathrooms of these minimal holiday apartments designed by Thisispaper Studio, which lie at the heart of the Polish capital. The two flats – named K916 and K907 – are set within an old print warehouse in Warsaw’s Praga district that was originally built in 1903, but has […] More

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      Ater Architects uses blue curtains as walls in Kyiv apartment

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      Cobalt-blue curtains hang in place of walls in a small apartment in Kyiv renovated by Ukrainian architecture and interiors studio Ater Architects. Called EGR Apartment, the 65-square-metre space was cramped, featuring a compartmentalised layout with separate rooms connected by corridors. The owners, a  young couple, asked Ater Architects to transform it into a light and […] More