Displaying posts from November, 2016

If a concrete home leaves us cold we’ll often describe it disparagingly as a bunker. So what happens when that concrete home is actually a bunker? If it’s this penthouse apartment atop a WWII above ground bunker in Hamburg, Germany what could have been sterile and oppressive is instead raw, warm and sophisticated. The loft-style space has four metre floor-to-ceiling windows, is filled with contemporary designer pieces and has two big balconies offering amazing views over the city. What makes this beautiful apartment even more exciting is that it is part of the luxury vacation accommodation offered through Welcome Beyond. It’s available from March 2017. In the meantime we can daydream of a getaway to help us through the Friday grind.

More architecture I can get behind. Quite a bit different in methods than my last post, here it is a contemporary interpretation of the traditional style in Poznań, Poland by architecture firm mode:lina. Form of this house: two blocks with a sloping roof and an asymmetric garage cube. It is complemented with simple, raw materials: bricks, concrete and sheet in shades of gray. The street facade has the least windows, protecting the inhabitants from the noise and gives them peace. In addition, various kinds of fences give them the sense of security. That’s where the house got the name from: the Fence House. The shape of this building was dictated by its function. Household members, parents and two children, wanted to live independently. Hence the idea of dividing it into two parts. Separate area on the first floor allows adults to enjoy tranquility while kids can go crazy in their “own house”. Ground floor is a common part for all inhabitants. There’s the unique kitchen extended into the garden and a large living room with mezzanine, reaching the attic. An unusual feature is the window in the hallway, which exhibits the owner’s unique car (my car buff husband says it’s a Lotus/Caterham 7) inside a graphite garage cube. 

(more work by mode:lina here)

I absolutely adore these spaces, and love the philosophy of architecture firm Hacket Holland (based in Notting Hill, London). Our approach is not dogmatic but responsive. We hope our buildings have ‘good manners’ in relation to their neighbours and natural setting. We reject the fashionable late 20th Century notion of Architecture as ‘objects in space’. We believe that in the future successful Architecture will be defined as that which responds to its immediate surroundings and to the wider environment in a meaningful way. Our aim is to create forms and spaces that are beautifully proportioned, considered, responsive, functional, practical and formed using good quality sustainable materials. We believe that this approach is truly modern – in the best sense – and that as the absolute necessity for sustainability becomes recognised on a global level, so ‘industrial’ modernism and current vacuous architectural fashions will become redundant.

It must be the scorching hot days that are plaguing my part of the world that has me obsessing over beach houses. Normally I’d be happy with a simple shack with a view and a breeze. That is until I see something just a bit more special.

On a rolling site overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, this beach house brings together two contrasting ideas – nineteenth century Shingle Style design, and a contemporary preference for material and textural expression over architectural detail. While the exterior captures the local design aesthetic, the interior treats light, space and surface in a distinctly modern fashion.

Compound in the Dunes by Ike Kligerman Barkley.

Photography by Peter Aaron

When a dog is the perfect finishing touch to a space. Perhaps this is why I have so many cats – I need one to match each room. 😉 Via William McLure