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      Makhno Studio celebrates Ukrainian craft in all-beige home near Kyiv

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      Kyiv-based Makhno Studio has paired soft, bumpy textures and intricate ceramic walls inside this all-beige home in Ukraine, which was completed right before the Russian invasion.

      Located in Kozyn, a rural town just south of Kyiv, Mureli House is a celebration of summertime and Ukrainian design, with mureli being an old Ukrainian word for apricot.
      Intricate ceramics feature throughout the Mureli House interior by Makhno StudioThe home, which was completed just two months before the start of the invasion in February 2022, comprises an open-plan living room and kitchen, three bedrooms with three bathrooms, a guest bathroom, a laundry room and a garage with a terrace.
      The clients – a local Ukrainian couple with a large family – requested from the outset that Makhno Studio should work with as many Ukrainian manufacturers and craftsmen as possible to create bespoke products for the house.
      A bulbous sculpture decorates the fireplace mantel in the lounge”All materials in the home are natural,” the studio’s founder Serhii Makhno told Dezeen. “The team used almost all Ukrainian brands and worked with several local contractors to minimise the distance and logistics.”

      The clients wanted a neutral, beige interior across all of the rooms to create a cohesive look. As a result, the house’s second floor is finished mostly in wood while the entire ground floor is decorated with beige-coloured plaster.
      Makhno designed the pendant lights in the lounge to resemble seed podsMakhno Studio emphasised the generous volumes and curved staircase in the home’s entrance hallway through a wall of three-dimensional ceramic tiles and a dramatic cluster of pendant lamps made of clay and polystyrene foam.
      References to the natural world are integrated throughout the interior. Highlights include a cluster of Makhno-designed pendants in the living room that resemble seed pods and washbasins that appear like hollowed-out boulders.
      The entire ground floor including the kitchen is finished in beige-coloured plasterThe only exception to Mureli House’s monochrome colour scheme is the main bathroom, which features pink accents including ombre shower doors and scale-shaped concrete tiles that can be tilted away from the wall to double up as hooks for hanging towels and bathrobes.
      “Ceramic craftsmanship is an ancient Ukrainian tradition,” Makhno explained. “At the end of the 1920s, the ceramic tradition began to be restored in various parts of Ukraine. At Makhno, the tradition is continued today to highlight its uniqueness and naturalistic appeal.”

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      Mureli House currently stands empty since the owners were forced to flee to safer areas in the west of Ukraine following Russia’s attempts to storm Kyiv in the early days of the war.
      The exact condition of the home is unknown. But Makhno Studio says a Russian military plane and several missiles were shot down over the surrounding area in Kozyn.
      Russian troops were forced to retreat from Kyiv at the start of April but left behind a trail of destruction in the city’s outskirts and have since carried out a number of airstrikes on the Ukrainian capital.
      The monochrome colour palette extends into the home’s three bedroomsIn total, more than 143 significant cultural sites have been damaged in Ukraine since the start of the war, including the Ivankiv Museum in Kyiv and several second world war memorial monuments in the surrounding region.
      Serhii Makhno says he currently remains safe in Ukraine, while the rest of his team is scattered throughout Europe and is working mainly on international projects.
      Boulder-like sinks and scale-shaped tiles feature in the main bathroomThe studio is among a number of Ukrainian practices that have told Dezeen they are now looking for support and commissions from foreign clients.
      Previous projects from the studio include Makhno’s own thatched-roof house in Kozyn and his duplex apartment in Kyiv.
      The photography is courtesy of Makhno Studio.

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      Sivak & Partners imagines contemporary beachside guest suite in Odessa

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      Craggy rock walls and a hot-spring style bathtub would feature in this imaginary Odessa hotel room that interior design studio Sivak & Partners has envisioned in a series of renderings.The guest suite would come as part of a boutique beach hotel in the Ukrainian port city of Odessa that Sivak & Partners’ chief designer, Alexey Gulesha, was challenged to create just over a year ago.
      He decided to share the studio’s renderings when the global coronavirus crisis began and put a pause on the design process.
      “This project started from the idea to make something different from other hotels in Odessa – the client had bought a plot and asked us to design something which we wanted to see there, so this is our proposal,” Gulesha told Dezeen.

      Influenced by the dazzling settings seen in James Bond films from the 1980s, Gulesha has envisioned the guest suite as being fronted by a curved, full-height window that offers sweeping vistas of the sandy shoreline and rolling ocean waves.

      In almost every room he has tried to foster a sense of “tactile contrast” – for example, in the bedroom, the hard stone floor is topped with a fluffy cream-coloured rug. A plump bed frame has also been placed beside a couple of Italian architect Cini Boeri’s glass Ghost chairs.

      “I like to draw people’s attention to the fact that the materials to the touch may not be what they seem visually,” Gulesha explained.
      “The Cini Boeri’s armchairs look like a cold piece of glass, but they are surprisingly convenient and comfortable when you sit in them.”

      A wall that resembles a craggy cliff face would feature in the study. Other than a simple steel desk and wooden chair, Gulesha has largely omitted standard office paraphernalia so that guests would be more inclined to spend relaxing time down on the beach instead of doing work.
      “The idea of the materials is that in this digital era, when work means sitting on the PC and answering email for two to three hours, I want to see and feel something natural,” added Gulesha.

      A focal point of the suite is the circular tub in the bathroom, which would slope up from the stone floors to make guests feel like they’re “bathing in a hot spring”.
      Bathroom facilities would be housed inside a see-through volume that, using smart-glass technology, would turn opaque whenever in use.

      Architectural visualisers imagine rainbow-coloured Sonora Art Village during pandemic

      The suite would also include a small kitchenette, should future guests not want to dine at the hotel’s restaurant. At its centre would be a timber prep counter that balances across a pair of chunky stone blocks.
      A couple of rounded boucle sofas would then be used to dress the lounge area, along with a blush-pink abstract artwork that is meant to mirror the texture of the surrounding mottled plaster walls.

      The pandemic has encouraged several architects and designers to turn to the medium of renderings and imagine getaway destinations.
      Siblings Mary and David Javit imagined Sonora Art Village, a community of rainbow-coloured houses in Mexico where people could head to escape “grey reality”. Inspired by the vivid architecture of figures like Luis Barragán and Ricardo Boffil, the houses would be surrounded by cacti and swimming pools.
      Child Studio also imagined Casa Plenaire, a blissful seaside villa where those in lockdown could picture enjoying the “perfect holiday”.

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      Say No Mo is a gender-neutral beauty salon and cocktail bar in Kyiv

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      Concrete surfaces and gold accents define Say No Mo, a salon-cum-cocktail bar in Kyiv that Balbek Bureau has designed to avoid gender stereotypes. Say No Mo salon takes over two floors of an early 20th-century building and includes its own bar where visitors can grab a drink before or after beauty treatments. When locally based
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