South African Modern House Design | Rondebosch | Cape Town | three14

" Designed for a young family in the suburban area of Rondebosch, Cape Town, this house sits on an elongated site with views towards Devil’s Peak and The Back Table, which is the south-eastern edge of the iconic Table Mountain. The client’s brief called for a contemporary, open plan home that provides a relaxed lifestyle and takes advantage of the site and its views.

​The resultant form is a minimal white box containing the bedroom accommodation on the first floor, hovering over the living spaces on the ground floor below. This box was articulated with strategic openings maximising views and exposure to light, with a central courtyard carved out adjacent to the kitchen and dining room to create a focal point. The mass of the floating box is broken down on the street façade with a dramatic screen wall which creates an open-air terrace for the guest wing of the house. The screen offers privacy from the street while allowing views and light to permeate and is constructed from standard pre-cast concrete breeze blocks reminiscent of a bygone era. ........more

Linked Houses | The Cyclops | Hilversum | The Netherlands | NIO

‘The twelve houses form an integral part of a soundproof embankment along a secondary road from Diependaal, an exclusive residential district in the woods of Hilversum. Despite its inhospitable setting and the clients’ initial scepticism, the futuristic, not to say fantastic, design of the houses attracted users who bought their houses of the drawing board, several years before delivery.
Without what is in effect a screen of houses, allowing the level of ambient noise to be brought down to acceptable limits, the rest of the urban design plan for Diependaal would never have seen the light of day. The project’s congenital, altruistic handicap justified the atypical solutions eventually proposed by Nio and his associates in the face of the client’s reservations. So for example the answer to the darkness at the back of the plot was to cantilever out the living room at the first floor level. Moreover, not everyone considers the lack of a garden to be a drawback, and a terrace can be a sales argument, even in suburbia........more

House Renovation And Transformation | Les Heures Claires | Belgium | Atelier d'Architecture Bruno Erpicum

The work involves renovating and transforming a house in the suburbs into a contemporary residential building. The owner wanted everything to have a fresh perspective, to be rethought and reworked: The architect took charge of the building and worked on it as if it were a sculpture which needs to be controlled from both the inside and the outside until a full appreciation is gained for the relationship the occupants have with the building in question. The architect will work on the house relentlessly, applying his formula of preference: “the right proportions shall have precedence over any form of decoration”. Since, two white walls have appeared on the avenue in the suburbs and two young trees can be seen in front of these walls which will grow and bear witness to the seasons of the year. As you enter the building, and before the family has a chance to extend its hospitality to you, a vast surface of water will arouse your senses.......more

Modern Three Bedroom Home Design | Texas Hill House | Craryville | New York | Incorporated NY

The form of this three bedroom home in rural Upstate New York emerged from the study of the traditional loft like cow barns that populate the landscape of the local farmland. Closed and formal from the entrance side and open and embracing of the landscape and views on the private side of the house the structure responds to both the demands of the site and the needs of its inhabitants. Eaves carefully control the sun and the shedding of rain and snow while extending the living spaces into the landscape.........more

Single Family House | House near Poznan Poland | Neostudio Architects

This project is located on a picturesque plot that originally was a home for seed drying installation of Agricultural University - and with its magnificent Acacia trees plantation and natural splendor was a design challenge for us.

The main task was to create a new structure that would accommodate a spacious single storey living space with a kitchen and a dining area. Existing building was to be refurbished to house a garage and storage functions in the ground floor and bedrooms in the upper level. New structure is attached to the existing one with the staircase. The entire building is clearly divided into two volumes - the old one with its historical charm that shows its primary usage and the addition that is a clean contemporary form. Used materials and large windows in the living space connect with the surrounding scenery - the form seems to be dissolved in the nature.........more

Single Family House | Mar Vista California | YU2E

Areas:
House- 2950 s.f.
Decks - 690 s.f.
Parking - Detached two car garage 484 s.f.
Recreation Room + Pool House - 459 s.f.

This was a first in a series of explorations of the single family suburban house. It is well documented that the single family program enables a relatively flexible and architecturally accommodating form.
It’s inherent “detached” quality panders to an individual’s tendency to be identified as separate or unique from the context.
This is especially pronounced in Mar Vista, a Venice Beach adjacent community with lots four times the size to contain four times more architecture.
But beyond the site, all other factors were finite and restricted.
While the zoning requirements were mild, the desires of the client did not match the resources available.
Big yards and large homes are difficult to marry even on a pretty generous lot. The usual budget constraints also limited the range of materials and systems available for implementation and relegated it to the ubiquitous Stucco and drywall over wood stick framing.
With the existing house footprint as a point of departure, an analysis of the private and public nature of the new program was conducted to determine the areas of all the desired as well as required spaces.
A distillation of their “privateness” separated them into different blocks that were “stacked” according to their relationship to use, circulation and adjacencies. This translated into a building with it’s program almost legible in its form.
It also resulted in varied setbacks beyond that usually required per zoning and made ample open space (yards and decks) possible.
Though the home was three stories tall, the extra open space negated the overall scale of the building.
The clean lines, stark finishes and modern nature are a departure from the mostly expected stylings of the surrounding neighborhood, but it does not stand overtly outside the edges of the standard suburban neighborhood.
There is transparency to the public side of domestic life. There is engagement with the public right-of-way with the requisite front lawn and mediating front porch and entry.
These are all elements found in classical homes that have been re-interpreted and re-expressed. .......more

The Braver House | Newton Massachusetts Designed By SSD

In many older suburbs, the typical pattern of construction is to replace an existing house with a much larger one built out to the legal setbacks. The Braver House is a prototypical alternative: To instead build a small, efficient residence that simultaneously minimizes its actual footprint, while maximizing its perceived sense of interior space. This is achieved through two devices: By expanding a screen to the setback line expanding the territory of the interior to the exterior, and by shifting the plan and section to capture elongated views from inside to outside. By claiming the under utilized lawn of the typical suburban yard and replacing it with permeable hardscape, potable water use is drastically reduced. Meanwhile the diminutive size of the house is coupled with a completely passive cooling system, a solar powered radiant heated floor and super insulated walls and roof.....more

Private House Stein | Cologne Germany Designed By

CLIENT: PRIVATE
GFA: 320 M²
COMPLETION: 2006

Although the ensemble consisting of two houses of differing size adopts the dominant typology of the two to three-storey gable roofed housing of its Cologne suburb, the reduction to essentials results in an abstraction of the house type. The solid, monolithic appearance is enhanced by the use of natural stone veneer cladding of grey Italian sandstone. Tapered reveals on one side of the windows to improve the entry of light also give expression to the cubic form of the house. Smooth, and without projections or overhangs, the zinc roof completes the picture of restrained material use. This architectonic approach can also be seen in the careful detailing of junctions.....more

Atherton Residence | San Francisco By Turnbull Griffin Haesloop Architects

Located on the peninsula south of San Francisco, this house sits on an internal suburban flag lot. The previous 1950s house, removed due to structural problems, featured mature landscaping and a manmade pond that the clients wanted to preserve. They wanted their new house to be a private retreat that maximizes the drama of the pond and takes advantage of the privacy of the site. The design solution breaks the program into four buildings – main house, study, pool house and garage – that ring the edge of the site and focus inward on the pond, garden and pool. Large sliding glass doors open directly out to the pond and terrace. The roofs conceal photovoltaic and solar hot water panels. The house is heated with a radiant system in the stone floors, and despite the hot climate it is not air conditioned, but passively cooled with a combination of overhangs, shades, and operable windows. The house also features many green building materials, including high fly-ash concrete, formaldehyde-free casework and denim insulation. The new house creates a special place for the clients, making a main residence feel like a vacation retreat.....more

Crabapple | House 10 | Hidden Creek | Randy Brown Architects

RBA was challenged to create a new type of suburban housing development that responds to both the demands of single-family homebuyers and addresses the problematic nature of sprawling cookie cutter housing developments. 12 homes have been designed that offer an affordable modern eco-friendly environment.....more

Jones House | Brunswick-Victoria,Australia | Kavellaris Urban Design

Jones House
Location:Brunswick-Victoria
Completion Date:2006
Photographer: Michael Payne

Shortlisted in 2007 AIA awards for Small Project

This house is a critique and a response to the suburban housing vernacular and the planning laws that influence them. An endeavour to provide an alternative affordable housing to conventional European influenced copies of copies that proliferate throughout our sub-urban landscape. An area much discussed and debated in the last decade within our profession.

The subject site is nestled on a corner in the backstreets of Brunswick that enjoys a northern orientation which we chose to exploit. Although the site is just over 200m2, it consists of all the programs found in a conventional sub-urban housing on an acre block; 3 bedrooms, 2 ensuites, bathroom, study, 2 separate living zones, a courtyard, double garage and backyard.

The aim of the project was not to re-engage and profess our manifesto on architectural and cultural regionalist issues and ideas; but merely to demonstrate alternatives and possibilities using cost effective and generic standardised building methods such as brick veneer, painted compressed sheet, and Colorbond roofing and cladding. A ‘make do with what you have’ approach was the critical architectural idea and the platform for the design process. This project was part of an ongoing study within our office, seeking to eliminate the idea that architectural ideas can only be achieved with big budgets and costly construction methods.

Our response establishes an alternative architecture; another rhetoric. One critical of the arrangement and order of space, material, colour, scale, environmental sustainability and urban engagement - another language for the average home! The outcome seeks to raise questions rather than to dictate answers about the generic Australian House. This is a big house on a small block. Yet it is very small in comparison to an average family house.

The design response is informed by the formal manipulation of a traditional hipped roof; stretched from the first to ground floor on one continuous plane thereby uniting 2 separate building elements and eliminating separate roof lines for each level. The intervention also enables the building to engage with the prominent corner site which highlights the forced perspective to the entry and floating down pipe (or water feature), resulting in a multi-dimensional reading of the building at pedestrian level. This creates an ambiguity of scale and the demarcation between the ground and first floor. Where does the ground floor end and the first floor begin?

The plan is both open and closed, solid and void. The design intent was to compartmentalise the space with the flexibility of separating independent spaces such as living and courtyard, dining and backyard or uniting as one continuous open space.

The space is as much about section as it is about plan. Form dictates function, the northern orientation enabled us to integrate environmental sustainability through passive solar design, utilising the sloping roof as a method of cross ventilation through skylights and bi-fold doors.

The peeled back pop-up skylight sheds some light on the spatial conundrum inside. Bigness competes with the compressing warped roof to negotiate access from ground to first floor.

Our practice adopts the philosophy that constraints in whatever form - budgets, planning policies or contextual -may be manifested as part of the design process and part of the discourse. The house explores the physical and spatial constraints of suburban building as a discourse rather than a limitation. The roof is the predominate element, sculptured by the mandatory setback diagram dictated in local planning policies.

Instead of replicating classical aesthetic ideas, the house distorts them as architectonic techniques, as in the emphasized point of entry, which is highlighted on the exterior by the converging roof and fence lines.
Inside the double height entry, a dramatic staircase accentuates the foyer and strategic views throughout the inside and out of the house meet the visitor.
Text and images KUD

House 60 | Toronto, Ontario, Canada | GH3

Architects: gh3 (gh3.ca)
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Design Team: Pat Hanson, Diana Gerrard, Raymond Chow, Liza Stiff, Vivian Chin
Structural Engineer: Blackwell Bowick
General Contractor: Blue Springs Construction
Project year: 2008-2009
Budget: CAD$800,000
Constructed Area: 315 m²
Photographs: Carlyle Routh (carlylecreative.com)
Source: e architect

Capece Venanzi house | Italy | Giovanni Vaccarini

Studio: Giovanni Vaccarini Architetto
Staff: Laura Marini ,Lucia Tomeo
Start: 2003
Complete: 2004 | 2005
Link: www.giovannivaccarini.it

Capece_Venanzi house is a suburban house, a house founded in the conurbation spread of the Adriatic coast in one of the possible areas of a city in any segment between Ascoli and Pescara.
An "intermediate", (apparently) "without qualities", Lacerta a land with no buildings on the offensive among the plains and the hill, in a piece of the city where the urban fabric has the first "stretch marks".
The project idea is to construct a building with a full orientation toward the hill, the hill that is seen as a sort of "sea" on which appear green.
The plant is defined by a section in development on three levels:
_ Fully excavated basement level in the soil, a patio is the focal point around which we organize the space, building a game of targets buried between the spaces / roof garden area the day (pt) / volume of the suspended floor second.
Ground floor is the part of the collective, where a large sliding glass window marks the border between the roof garden and its days covered uncovered. The space revolves around a metallicstairs that connects the first floor.
First floor: welcoming rooms and private spaces (bath / sauna, gym, studio).

The subject composition is played on the metaphor of the macro to transpose a piece of the game of tetris.
The two volumes bring contrasting scene in the two parts of the building and point to the diversity of use with a dual processing material, a base covered in stone with a volume of white plaster.
The foundation stone is "cut" on the western front by a glass wall at full height, while the volume stereo metric superimposed on the ground floor presents a plot of bucature free and circulars.
The series of free bucature are also the plot of the design of the panels made of aluminum shielding bucature large south-west and that "slipped" in the basement painting fences, gates and closure systems.
Light is one of the materials of the project. The system of bucature cut in the walls and floor covering designs during the day the shadows and lights in the flow volume of the second floor, the ground floor light floods all the spaces. At night a system of LED lighting (operated by a controller) defines a set of "backgrounds" that turn the front glass of the first floor into a wall projector / screen.
In the game against the glass wall (light) is using the volume of the cantilevered first floor.
Text and images from Archiportale