Steven holl architects | Sun slice House

This Sun slice house is another great residential project by Stevenholl architects. Located in Lake Garda Italy, this 3,800 sf weekend homes is designed for an italian lighting company owner and his family is organized to frame slices of sunlight. While the owner's profession revolves around artificial light, slices of natural light and their change in space throughout the day and year is the focus of the house.


















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While most elevations are simple rectangles strategically sliced and cut for the play of light within, the north façade is made of glass with views of Lake Garda. In order to emphasize the bends and changes in the strips of sunlight, simple cubic volumes form the basic building geometry. These are loosely joined in topological sheet rubber-like geometry, which also inscribes wind-protected courts on both sides of the house. Changes of season and weather allow different courtyard opportunities.





















This weekend house on Lake Garda for an Italian lighting company owner and his family is organized to frame slices of sunlight.

The steel frame and concrete structure is skinned with an alloy of copper, steel, chromium, and nickel, which weathers to a leathery red color. Interiors are white plaster with terrazzo floors on the ground level while bamboo floors cover the second. Natural ventilation and geothermal heating and cooling are part of the energy plan.

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Posted in: Architects

"SHIRO" by Takuya Hosokai + Hiromasa Mori

"SHIRO" by Takuya Hosokai + Hiromasa Mori Details :
Design / designer : 1980 / Takuya Hosokai + Hiromasa Mori
Location : Fukui city, Fukui prefecture, Japan
Project : Beauty Salon
Built : June, 2006
structure : Steel-frame building
site area : 194.26 sqm | building area : 78.17 sqm | total floor area : 166.79 sqm



A great building by japanese architect named SHIRO which mean White in english, Shiro is a hair beauty salon located in Fukui, Japan, made by architects 1980/Takuya Hosokai + Hiromasa Mori.



About the Architect "Takuya Hosokai" :

2008 :
- Office for Metropolitan Architecture, Rotterdam

2005 :
- Established TAKUYAHOSOKAI
- Yokohama National University , Yokohama , Japan
- M.E. in Architectural Design

2003 :
- Yokohama National University , Yokohama , Japan
- B.E. in Architectural Design

1980 :
- Born in Niigata, Japan



The design is simple, and with a very eye-catching look. Great outlines, unusual angles with a little tension, and ’sharp’ is sure to add meaning to their hair dressing services! This building was finished in 2006 as the designers say.

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Posted in: Architects,Japan House

Benjamin Murua & Constanza Infante | Countryside House

Architects: Benjamín Murúa A. - Constanza Infante S.
Collaborator: Paula Phillips
Locaction: Lo Prado, Curacaví, Chile
Estructural Engineer: Luis Ignacio Correa P.
Construction company: Carlos Torres U.
Site Area: 3985 sqm
Constructed Area: 415 sqm
Project Year: 2006
Construction Year: 2007-2008
Photography: Cristóbal Palma

The expansion and renovation project of the countryside house is located on the road to Cuesta Lo Prado, on Curacavi city (Metropolitan Region). The building sits on a plain between the hills and the valley on a widely open space overlooking the hills on the east and the valley on the west.

Requirement was to expand the house adding 3 bedrooms and a sala but keeping the existing geometry intact. The objective of the project was to reuse and emphazise some elements of the Chilean houses of the early 20th century present in the pre-existing building like patios, galleries and open corridors.

The house had an “L” shape layout housing a sequence of bedrooms with a gallery on the east side and a open corridor on the west. This 2 circulations were use and extended to the north so as to integrate all with a second “L”where the new bedrooms and sala were included, connecting the old part with the new one with a threshold.

With this operation, the gallery took the place of the core circulation connecting all the areas but also as place to stay because of its width and orientation to the morning sun and the hills. On the other side, the corridor was extended to the garden overlooking the valley and protected from the heat during summer days. The bedrooms and the sala surround a patio that being enclosed becomes an inner court as an extension of the sala.

Once the gates that contain the space are opened, the garden blends with the geography of the hill, bringing it into the project. The configuration of the house allowed working with open corridors, galleries and patios and to give it a fresh look contemporary materials were use like glass, steel, wood and concrete.

The sofits disappeared and special constructive details use on the joints between the windows and the roof taking advantage of the lightness of the materials.

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Posted in: Architects,Homes Renovation

Shubin + Donaldson Architects - Luxury Home Urban Spa

Designed by Shubin + Donaldson Architects, this modern luxury home makes outdoor living part of its innovative interior through direct backdoor access to the beach, an integrated courtyard, sun-drenched decks and an outdoor sleeping veranda. With an idea for a spa-like retreat and a spectacular beachfront property along Malibu’s Pacific Coast Highway, the Urban Spa House was born.






















The home ’s geometric architecture is cool and calm. It makes way for the bright, spacious and soothing interior boasting white walls, frosted glass, plenty of windows a pedestrian-friendly plan of 2,900 sq. ft.






















The initial task was to renovate the original 1976 dwelling into a contemporary urban retreat, whilst adding some structural reinforcement. Bought in 2001 for it's location, the owners, together with the architects, went on to extensively remodel the house into an urban oasis. Concious efforts to negate the road behind and emphasise the beach in front are evident throughout.



























Architect: Shubin + Donaldson Architects - Robin Donaldson, AIA, Principal and Russell Shubin, AIA, Principal
Interiors: Audrey Alberts, interior design consultant
Commenced: 2001

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Posted in: Architects,Modern House

Thom Faulders Architects on "Deform House"

Deform House build by Thom Faulders Architect was brought on to consult on an efficient method for production and to then process and fabricate the individually pieced ceiling patterns.

The variegated ceiling and rear wall lining is composed of a series of milled patterns that modulates throughout the space, wrapping, bulging and aligning in continuously unique ways depending on the viewers position.

When Bay Area architect Thom Faulders was hired to renovate and enlarge a faux French house in San Francisco’s Potrero Hill neighborhood in 2004, he received only one directive. “He said he needed walls, walls, walls for the artwork,” Faulders says of client Jeff Dauber, a Silicon Valley technologist with a sizable art collection. “Given that, I thought I’d take over the ceiling.”

Deform House is a third level addition and extensive renovation to an existing two level single-family residence in San Francisco. The function of the top floor is for a Private Art Gallery, with a new Master Suite considered as an integrated extension of this space. The addition is approximately 1,200 sq. ft., and is constrained by existing structural walls and neighboring structures.

With the need to maximize vertical wall surfaces for art, the design emphasizes the ceiling plane with a pattern of optically shifting grooves. Sheathing the entire top floor ceiling and rear wall, this lining unifies the spaces and is in contrast with the architectural neutrality of the smooth walls. An entry gate is perforated with a security warning written in binary code text.

The project is a third level addition and extensive renovation to an existing two level single-family residence in San Francisco. The function of the top floor is for a Private Art Gallery, with a new Master Suite considered as an integrated extension of this space.

The addition is approximately 1,200 sq. ft., and is constrained by existing structural walls and neighboring structures. With the need to maximize vertical wall surfaces for art, the design emphasizes the ceiling plane with a pattern of optically shifting grooves. Sheathing the entire top floor ceiling and rear wall, this lining unifies the spaces and is in contrast with the architectural neutrality of the smooth walls. An entry gate is perforated with a security warning written in binary code text.

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Posted in: Architects,Homes Renovation

Alvaro Leite Siza / Tolo House

The “Tolo House” build by Alvaro Leite Siza is based in Lugar das Carvalhinhas - Alvite, Cerva Parish, Ribeira da Pena Commune, Vila Real District with an area of around 1000m2. The house is build on a sharply inclined hill. Its fragmentation, necessary due to the steep topography, transforms the whole into a composition of small linked and interconnected volumes, creating an unevenness that allows for a more secure and rational use of the lot. In this way the house’s various functions are clarified with each elevation corresponding to a single compartment.

The project consists of a holiday home with three bedrooms, a social bathroom, a living room, a dinning room, a small kitchen with a support washbasin, pantry, and even a small outdoor swimming pool. The terrain is sharply inclined and has a particular configuration: it is very long and narrow. However, the fact that it faces south allows it to receive optimal solar exposure and to enjoy a particular natural view. The living area does not exceed 180m2.

About Álvaro Leite Siza Vieira

Álvaro Leite Siza Vieira was born in Porto, Portugal in 1962. He worked as a curricular trainee at the architecture studio of Eduardo Souto de Moura in 1992, and graduated from the Faculty of Architecture in Escola do Porto in 1994. Before that, he collaborated with his father, architect, Alvaro Siza Vieira on a first project in Lisbon in 1987, a competition for the Museum of Contemporary Art in Helsinki in 1992 and the Olympic complex of the University of Palermo in 1995. He has participated in competitions, exhibited his own works at international design exhibitions, and designed many houses around Portugal.

For reasons of functionality and integration, it was opted to organize the main entrance based on the street where car transit was possible. This road leads to the northern higher part of the lot. Nevertheless, it is possible to access the house from a more rustic footpath from the south. Its fragmentation, necessary due to the steep topography, transforms the whole into a composition of small linked and interconnected volumes, creating an unevenness that allows for a more secure and rational use of the lot.

In this way the house’s various functions are clarified with each elevation corresponding to a single compartment. The roof functions simultaneously as pavement support for the gardens: similar to the traditional threshing floors and patios in the northern regions of the country with hilly terrain.

Project Detail :
Architects: Alvaro Leite Siza
Client: Luís Marinho Leite Barbosa da Silva
Location: Lugar das Carvalhinhas - Alvite, freguesia de Cerva, Ribeira da Pena District
Site Area: 1000 sqm
Constructed Area: 180 sqm
Contractor: Óscar Gouveia
Landscape: Alvaro Leite Siza Vieira
Materials: Concrete
Services: GOP
Project Start: 2000
Project Complete: 2005
Photographers: Alvaro Leite Siza / F&S Guerra

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Posted in: Architects,Modern House

Shigeru Ban Architects | Metal Shutter Houses

This is a new under construction project on West Chelsea [ 9 unit condo ] that was designed by japanese Shigeru Ban Architects. The project is located on the south side of West 19th Street, between 10th and 11th Avenues in West Chelsea’s art gallery district, right next to the High Line, the Hudson River Park, Ghery´s IAC Building and Jean Nouvel´s 100 11th.

On this building, Shigeru Ban once again innovates on the material use by incorporating motorized perforated metal shutters on its -dynamic- facade, which act as light-modulating privacy screen at the outer edge of each residence’s terrace adjacent to the double-height living rooms.

From their website: This subtle “removable skin” echoes the neighboring gallery after-hours shutters, subtly contextualizing the building within its site. The building can literally become a uniform minimal cube, or it can open completely (as well as virtually unlimited permutations between). South of the loggia, twenty foot tall, upwardly pivoting glass walls open completely, thus blurring the boundary between the inside and outside – the double height living room and loggia become one.

Similarly, a series of interior sliding glass doors create an open “universal floor” in each of the duplex houses – one vast and uninterrupted expanse which transitions seamlessly from inside to outside, or partition the space into private areas.

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Posted in: Architects,Housing,Japan House

SETON MAINS HOUSE, by Paterson Architects

A Contemporary Interpretation of traditional rural buildings, the proposal for seton mains aim to provide a modest home for a family of four. The buliding is sited to take advantage of spectacular views to the north whilst also maximising natural daylight and minimising overlooking of neighbouring properties. Designed by Paterson Architects

An autonomous volume, the building form is inspired by the setting of traditional structures within a rural environment. From tower houses to agricultural buildings and ruined cottages. These structures, often silhouetted on the horizon stand in stark but harmonious opposition to the surrounding landscape.

Budget: £200,000 Completed: October 2005























A new 3 bedroom timber framed 120m² house built on the edge of a traditional East Lothian farm steading. Clad in Western red cedar the superstructure sits on a waterproof concrete base cut into the site grade.

Conceived as a modern interpretation of traditional rural artisan dwellings, the house draws on the language of autonomous agricultural structures and their settings within rural environments: Often in stark, but harmonious opposition to their surroundings.




























The building, which is planed upside down, provides sleeping and sanitary accommodation on the ground floor, with an open plan living space on the first. Large openings are carefully sited to take advantage of spectacular views over the Firth of Forth to the North and East, with further views of Edinburgh to the west; whilst minimising overlooking of neighbouring properties. Sun and daylight are brought deep into the plan by two large overhead rooflights.

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Posted in: Architects

Art, Nature, and the Science of Sustainable Design on Lake Washington Residence

This is the Lake Washington Residence Project that was brings to you by Osca Architect, Located in Seattle, Washington, This waterfront home project is bringing themes of art, nature, and the science of sustainable design. Site orientation is the main attention for this house project to respond to features of site ( existing shade trees ), the sun's path, optimal views across the lake, prevailing winds, and the clients’ intention to actively use the outdoor spaces on and around their home.
















































































Photograph by : Eduardo Calderón

With natural ventilation of the interior spaces, the house of many outdoor patios and terraces truly provide a connection to nature that clients expect to open the house outside the dining room, lounging, entertaining, and gardening.

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Posted in: Architects