Ukrainian architecture studio Replus Bureau has renovated a 20th-century villa in Lviv, contrasting the exposed surfaces of its historic shell with contemporary extensions and finishes.

Named Villa Quince after a neighbouring grove of fruit trees, the dwelling near Znesinnia Park was originally designed in 1906 in a neoclassical style and altered by the architect Józef Hornung in 1922.

By the time Replus Bureau were tasked with renovating the home, it had stood abandoned for many years and was falling into disrepair.

Alongside the repair and restoration of the villa's shell, the studio added cubic volumes to expand its ground floor and create an additional storey, offering deliberate contrasts to the original structure that continue through the interiors.

"We were not interested in imitation," the studio told Dezeen. "The new volumes remain calm and restrained, allowing the historic architecture to stay legible."

"The project's idea became clear: avoid nostalgic reconstruction. In a way, we wanted the building to tell a simple story in the future: that it lived through different periods and was reconstructed in 2025," it added.

"The same dialogue between old and new continues in the interior, where restored historic elements coexist with carefully placed contemporary interventions."

The original enfilade-style layout of Villa Quince was maintained, with a study, bedroom and bathroom wrapping a kitchen at the centre of the ground floor.

This kitchen now flows into a ground-floor extension, where a living and dining area overlooks the surrounding gardens through two corners of full-height glazing.

Above, the first-floor extension contains three ensuite bedrooms, housed within a pale rendered, rectilinear volume that projects above the roofline of the existing villa.

Throughout Villa Quince, fragments of historic wall finishes have been exposed, which informed the pale tones of the newly-plastered surfaces that surround them.

These surfaces are complemented by deep brown parquet floors and bathrooms clad with alabaster tiles, while the upstairs bathrooms have a more contemporary palette of mosaic tiles in grey and coral.

"The most important aspect was preserving balance: reconstruction in a historic environment is always unpredictable, and the process becomes a continuous adjustment between preservation and transformation," explained the studio.

"French herringbone parquet in a deep inky tone anchors the main rooms, while a tall brass skirting board runs through the spaces like a continuous line. Bathrooms reinterpret Art Nouveau traditions through mosaics, alabaster tiles and plastered surfaces," Replus Bureau added,

"The doors are fitted with sculptural handles by Tom Dixon – deliberately contemporary and slightly ironic within the historic setting."

Similar restorations recently featured on Dezeen include the updating of a 1930s villa in Poland by Wiercinski Studio, where revealing the "raw and honest" layers of the home informed a series of industrial-feeling bespoke fittings and furniture pieces.

In a recent Dezeen feature, Ukrainian designers explained how the ongoing war with Russia has made the country's interiors "bolder and more interesting".

The photography is by Andriy Bezuglov. 

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Austere brick walls cloak a bright skylit painting studio at the heart of Atelier Cambre in Argentina, designed by local architecture practice Esteras Perrote.

The studio sits nestled within the mountainous, forested landscape of Còrboda's Punilla Valley, and was created for Argentinian artist Juan José Cambre.

Tasked with recreating the feeling of painting outdoors, Esteras Perrote organised the studio around a five-metre-high painting space, which is illuminated by long skylights and opens onto a terrace through a set of folding glass doors.

"One of the central gestures of the project emerged from a very simple request from the client: the possibility of painting outdoors," said the studio's co-founder Gonzalo Perrote.

"From that idea, we began to explore how the architecture could incorporate that experience without losing the sense of refuge of the studio," Perrote told Dezeen.

"Rather than a collection of rooms, the project proposes a generous working environment where light, landscape and painting structure the experience of the place."

The large volume containing Atelier Cambre's main studio space is connected to a tower-like service and circulation volume via a short, glazed link.

This tower contains bathrooms and a staircase leading up onto a rooftop terrace.

Both volumes have been clad in locally-sourced red brick, a choice informed by a small structure that had formerly stood on the site as well as a desire to blend in with the landscape.

Inside, the painting area sits beneath four long, narrow skylights. At the opposite end, a study area and small kitchenette are tucked under a steel mezzanine level that offers a vantage point over the painting space.

Carefully placed openings throughout the building frame views of the surrounding woodland, with two tall, narrow openings at the end of the painting space creating cross-ventilation to facilitate drying.

White finishes and natural wood floors create a minimal backdrop to Cambre's paintings, with the only colour in the interiors being a series of green cabinet doors alongside the kitchenette.

"Rather than imposing itself on the landscape, the architecture seeks to situate itself within it, using that open space as an opportunity," fellow co-founder Lucía Esteras told Dezeen.

"In this sense, each window was conceived as a specific frame of the surroundings, almost as a device to capture fragments of the landscape and bring them back into the interior," he added.

Other painting studios recently featured on Dezeen include The Grey County Studio in Ontario by Verge Select, which comprises three intersecting weathered steel volumes that overlook a woodland, and a historic barn restored by Schack Arkitektur for the painter Michael Kvium in Denmark.

The photography is by Javier Agustín Rojas.

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Dublin studio Architectural Farm has renovated a home in Ireland called Seagull Cottage, adding a larch-clad extension informed by railway sheds and bird hides.

Positioned alongside a railway track between the sea and a stretch of protected wetland on Wicklow's coast, the home comprises two terraced 19th-century railway cottages that had previously been combined.

Architectural Farm was tasked with reconfiguring the home's layout, opening up its interiors to natural light and views of the landscape, and adding a 13-square-metre extension at its western end.

The timber extension was informed by the bird hides found in the nearby wetlands and is perched with just one wall touching the ground to minimise its impact on the landscape.

"While the site sits between protected wetlands to the west and the Irish sea to the east, bar views through the small cottage's windows on the first floor, the house practically ignored its amazing context," Architectural Farm co-founder Shane Cotter told Dezeen.

"The extension is expressed as a light, independent form – sloping away from the existing gable in deference to the cottage, minimally grounded, floating above the landscape to limit soil sealing and mitigate against decreasing biodiversity," he continued.

"Timber cladding felt appropriate, given the form of the new building being articulated as a structure elevated and lightly touching the ground, but also takes its inspiration from bird hides and railway architecture, as well as Irish agricultural buildings."

Architectural Farm reconfigured the route into the existing cottage, creating a sheltered porch and entrance lobby. This leads into a large skylit living, dining and kitchen area on the ground floor.

The extension sits half a floor above this living space, with a stair leading up into a raised seating area dubbed "The Perch", where windows on all sides provide views across both the sea and the wetlands.

"A new living space on a half-level between ground and first floor, which takes advantage of the available views south to the sea and west to the sunset, while also not overshadowing or dominating the proportions of the existing cottage," Cotter explained.

"The pitched roof gives a sense of volume and generosity to the interior, despite the small footprint, and foundations are minimal with only one wall touching the ground," he added.

White walls and ceilings unite the interior of the existing home and extension, complemented by stone floors and pale-blue details in the kitchen.

On the first floor, an ensuite bedroom sits tucked beneath the original cottage's gabled roof, with a balcony incorporating large glass panels overlooking the living area below.

Based in Dublin, Architectural Farm was founded in 2010 by Cotter alongside Kathryn Wilson. Previous projects by the studio include the extension of a home in Dublin with a large, timber-framed sliding window.

Other recently completed Irish houses on Dezeen include a coastal residence by Pasparakis Friel that embraces its "exposed island context" and the red-roofed Gate Lodge by A2 Architects.

The photography is by Fionn McCann.

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An exterior of charred timber and thatch is contrasted by a vibrant interior palette of blues and purples at this riverside home in Riga, Latvia designed by architecture studio OAD.

Located in Riga's suburbs, the 641-square-metre summer home named BPROM is comprised of a two-bedroom dwelling and an independent annexe containing a sauna and guest suite.

Drawing on the appearance of traditional Latvian homesteads, OAD designed a barn-like form with several contemporary twists. It includes a bowed thatched roof and a blue and purple interior palette that references the dragonflies found in the nearby river.

"The design was born out of the question: how do we integrate Latvian ethnography and traditions within the 21st century architecture?" OAD founder and lead architect Zane Tetere-Sulce told Dezeen.

"Grounded in the local craft, the project revives forgotten materials that have shaped Latvian architecture for centuries: a thatched reed roof and a charred timber façade."

"We drew inspiration from a little neighbour, the dragonfly, and developed a bold interior design saturated in rich hues of blue and purple," added the studio.

The layout of the home also looked to typical homesteads, with both the main building and accompanying sauna house organised on a single, slightly angled axis that shelters a south-facing garden from northern winds.

Inside, wall and ceiling finishes, furniture and fittings all incorporate blue and purple hues, enhanced by coloured curtains and glass screens that aim to replicate the iridescent quality of a dragonfly's wings.

In the living, dining and kitchen space that occupies the entire ground floor, a dark shade of blue was used to finish the gently curving gabled ceiling and kitchen counters, while an adjacent pantry is finished in a pastel lilac shade.

Sliding doors within a fully-glazed gable end connect this long living space out onto a sheltered terrace, where seating is organised around a weathered steel fireplace.

Above, the smaller first floor of the home contains a blue-ceilinged study and two bedrooms, with the main bedroom wrapped by pale purple linen curtains beneath a lilac ceiling to create a sense of "intimacy and safety".

In the sauna house, a circular lounge space sits alongside a steam room and cold plunge pool, with a guest bedroom and upper terrace positioned above.

Contrasting the home's colourful interiors, the exterior of BPROM has been clad in timber planks that were charred to create a deep, inky shade, with matching vertical timber louvres used to shade the home's windows and terraces.

"The architectural finishes were restricted to only three primary materials: reed thatch, timber and metal," said Tetere-Sulce.

"The thatched reed roof has been used in Latvia for centuries, but today it is also one of the most sustainable choices."

Other homes in Latvia recently featured on Dezeen include The Pāvilosta House by local studio Made, a coastal home which also took the typical form of a barn and transformed it with a twisting slate roof.

The photography is by Alvis Rozenbergs.

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A thin frame of Douglas fir timber brings a "sense of lightness" to this pavilion-like extension in London, recently completed by local studio Emil Eve Architects.

Named Talbot Road, the project adds a large kitchen and snug at the back of an Edwardian end-of-terrace in the Highgate Conservation Area.

Looking to strengthen the home's connection to its garden, Emil Eve Architects created a lightweight timber structure with a latticed roof that extends outwards to form a deep pergola.

"The owners wanted an inspiring addition to the house's period architecture, so we developed a deliberately contemporary design," Emil Eve Architects director Ross Perkin told Dezeen.

"This was centred on the idea of a pavilion which has real impact while still feeling elegant and light, and creates a sense of connection with the landscape," he added.

Stepping down from the level of the main home, the layout of the extension was led by a desire for it to face the garden in two directions – from the kitchen to the north and from a smaller snug to the south.

Rather than divide the space with walls, the snug area is demarcated by another drop in the floor level, as well as a circular skylight above and a section of low wall extending from a thin column to one side.

The latticed Douglas fir roof structure has been stained white, contrasted below by bespoke oak joinery and storage for the kitchen counters.

"The staggered form of the extension allows it to connect with the garden on two sides – feeling like you are really 'in' it, rather than just looking 'out' over it," Perkin said.

"Although the space is largely open plan, we have used level changes to delineate different areas – for instance the snug."

"The timber roof structure has been left exposed inside too and its pattern also creates a sense of different spaces within the plan, with light being cast through from the different-shaped roof lights," he added.

Outside, the large pergola both helps to prevent the glazed extension from overheating and shades a patio space, wrapped by thin Douglas fir columns atop cast concrete feet.

Ridged ceramic tiles made from 50 per cent recycled waste were used to clad the exterior of the extension, while thin metal frames surround a series of large sliding windows and doors.

"The small details are what make it stand out and for that we are grateful to our excellent contractor," said Perkin.

"Our close working relationship is what made bespoke elements – like the in-situ cast concrete feet which provide both weatherproofing and bring a sense of lightness to the pavilion – work," he added.

Emil Eve Architects was founded in 2009 by Ross and Emma Perkin. Previous projects by the studio include the expansion of a home in east London with terracotta tile-clad rear and loft extensions and its own office in a brutalist building in Hackney.

The photography is by Taran Wilkhu.

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Indian studio Compartment S4 has completed a cowshed in Maharashtra, using a palette of brick, stone and bamboo to elevate its utilitarian spaces into a "humane, climate-responsive habitat".

Named Gaughar or Cow House, the project sits within a 340-acre fruit orchard in the coastal town of Dahanu, and replaces a dilapidated shed with a series of open, airy spaces that prioritise the comfort of both staff and cows.

Rather than demolishing the existing structure, Compartment S4 retained its steel frame, which was painted red and infilled with walls of locally-sourced black basalt stone and brickwork punctured by large archways and perforated sections.

This reconstruction was guided by a new layout based around hygiene and the everyday routines of the cattle and their caretakers. The studio created alternating enclosed and open spaces that allow for easy circulation, ventilation and daylight.

"The layout balances operational efficiency with animal comfort, creating a system where architecture quietly supports the daily rhythms of care, movement, and agricultural activity," Compartment S4 co-founder Kishan Shah told Dezeen.

"These sheds are designed as breathable structures, with indoor resting areas extending directly into outdoor paddocks so that cows can move freely between shaded and open environments," he continued.

"Together, these gestures redefine the Gaughar as a humane and climate-responsive habitat, where architectural form, animal wellbeing, and ecological systems are closely intertwined."

In order to instil a sense of what Compartment S4 described as "warmth and craftsmanship" into the otherwise utilitarian spaces, various locally crafted elements were incorporated into its design.

Bamboo ceilings were made in collaboration with artisans from the Dang region, while openable windows are infilled with sections of block-printed ajrakh fabric.

Traditional jali screens informed the perforated brickwork sections on the shed's gable ends, and matka – clay pots used for storing water – were a reference point for the water troughs in both the sheds and shaded areas of the surrounding paddock.

"Much of the inspiration came from vernacular agricultural structures and traditional material practices that naturally respond to climate," said Shah.

"Elements such as arched masonry walls, porous brick jalis, and bamboo ceilings draw from regional knowledge systems while being adapted to the scale and needs of a contemporary cattle facility," he continued.

"The textiles bring colour, familiarity and cultural memory into the working environment, helping instil a sense of ownership among the people who manage and care for the cattle every day."

Elsewhere in India, architecture practice Studio Saar recently completed a dairy farm in Rajasthan, using a palette of reclaimed steel and rubble that was all sourced from within a 30-kilometre radius of the site.

The photography is by The Space Tracing Company.

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Georgian studio TIMM Architecture has completed House of Iron Doors, a home on the outskirts of Tbilisi that features an openable facade of perforated weathered steel shutters.

TIMM Architecture aimed to transform the aesthetic of high fences and walls of many homes in the neighbourhood into "an architectural experience rather than a defensive barrier" for this house in the village of Okrokana.

"The project began with a simple observation: in many suburban contexts the wall becomes the most dominant architectural element, while the house itself disappears behind it," the studio told Dezeen.

"Exploring the relationship between wall, facade and garden led to a key question: what if the perimeter wall itself became architecture?"

House of Iron Doors sits slightly raised above ground level, with an L-shaped plan that hugs a rear garden and is buffered from the street behind a strip of planting.

The street-facing section of this volume has been almost entirely given over to a large, glazed living area, which the facade's shutters allow to be either completely open or closed, with light filtering in through small circular perforations.

Opposite, sliding glass doors open the living area and the adjacent dining room onto the central courtyard, facing a wall of weathered steel covered in metal mesh to support climbing plants.

"When the doors are fully opened, the house behaves almost like a pavilion where interior and exterior merge into a continuous living environment," said the studio.

"The spatial atmosphere changes depending on the position of the facade panels: when closed, the house feels protective and introspective; when opened, it becomes transparent and outward-looking."

TIMM Architecture chose weathering steel to create what it called an "infrastructural presence" on the street, with a monolithic appearance when the shutters are closed that is contrasted by the home's minimal, largely monochromatic interiors.

The perpendicular wing of the home contains two storeys of bedrooms, while above the living area a swimming pool opens out onto a rooftop terrace via sliding glass doors.

"Material selection was guided by the conceptual idea of the façade as both boundary and mechanism," explained the studio. "Weathered steel was chosen for the operable doors because it expresses solidity, durability and transformation."

"Other materials are intentionally restrained and minimal, allowing the movement of the facade and the spatial relationships of the house to remain the primary architectural expression," it continued.

Beneath the home, a basement floor contains a garage accessed via a ramp at the front of the home, as well as a games room, utility and storage spaces.

Other projects that have recently incorporated large shutters include an office in Fujisawa City by Schemata Architects, which features a facade of operable corrugated metal shutters.

The photography is by Grigory Sokolinsky.

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A circular conversation pit sits at the heart of Seaside House, the renovation of a 1930s coastal cabin near Bordeaux by Studio Razavi.

Studio Razavi updating the 1930s cabin, which is nestled among pine trees at the tip of the Cap Ferret headland on the Atlantic coast, for contemporary living.

Driven by the idea of creating an uninterrupted flow through the centre of Seaside House, the studio removed all of the cabin's central partition walls to create a single, open living space, which opens out onto a decked terrace at either side.

"The local lifestyle revolves around constantly moving in and out of houses, which led us to opt for a centrally sunken living room that creates a circulation flow all around," project architects Guillen Berniolles and Michele Sacchi told Dezeen.

"All existing partitions were demolished, leaving the building's envelope untouched so a circle – the living room – could be placed at the centre of the house, surrounded by bedrooms," they continued.

"Sinking the living area was important so it would be clearly delineated without interrupting views across the building, from one facade to the other."

Around the edge of this circular conversation pit, a low wall integrates elements that support the surrounding dining and kitchen areas, including a sink and storage units.

A pale concrete floor, white walls and oak carpentry bring a light, airy feel to the central space, while to the north a gently curved section of wall follows the curve of the central seating area.

The three en-suite bedrooms on either side of Seaside House's living area feature similar finishes, with windows overlooking the home's terrace and skylights in the bathrooms.

"Because everything is built directly on sand, floors are poured-in-place concrete to avoid joints and simplify maintenance," explained Berniolles and Sacchi.

"Most furniture pieces are solid wood or veneer, directly referencing this region, home to France's largest forest and Europe's largest man-made forest," they added.

To the west of the main cabin, a smaller guest bedroom annexe is housed in a new, standalone volume clad in dark timber to blend with the surrounding tree trunks.

Studio Razavi was founded by architect Alireza Razavi and has offices in London, Paris and New York.

Previous projects by the studio include the renovation of an apartment in a historic Lyon neighbourhood, and a Spanish tapas bar and restaurant in New York informed by a market in Barcelona.

The photography is by Simone Bossi.

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A pair of gabled volumes conceal the expansive timber-lined interiors of Light House, a home in the Netherlands designed by local studio Woonpioniers.

Located in the village of Nigtevecht in Utrecht, the home is tucked within a row of homes on a sloping, narrow plot close to a river.

Aiming to maximise this challenging site, Amsterdam-based Woonpioniers designed the home as two gabled volumes that slot together "like puzzle pieces", with stepped floor levels and mezzanines that create deceptively expansive and high-ceilinged interiors.

"By leaning into the restrictions, we – together with the clients – co-created a house that feels larger than its square footage," the studio told Dezeen.

"The house hides a radical, vapour-permeable, multi-level timber interior behind a facade that respects the characteristic streets of a historic Dutch village, a sort of 'wolf in sheep's clothing' strategy – modernity tucked inside tradition," it added.

The ground floor of Light House has been largely given over to a kitchen, playroom and living room.

Each of these ground-floor spaces was designed to flow into the next with the floor level stepping upwards, culminating in a fully-glazed gable end in the living room.

To the east, a more compartmentalised area houses an office, utility room and bathroom.

A stair leads up to the first-floor bedrooms and bathrooms, which hang above the open living area below and are connected by a small steel-and-timber bridge.

Above, an angular skylight splits open the apex of the home's roof, drawing light down between the bedroom volumes and into the living spaces. It is complemented by additional skylights in the sloping ceilings.

"Fluidity and openness to the exterior of the spaces where you are to be together were our main aims in the design," said the studio.

"The main living space, the kitchen and the playroom for the kids are placed on separate floor levels, which have an open relation to each other and which all feel like the outside came in for a bit."

"The living room sits just a touch higher, creating a cosy, sheltered atmosphere without losing its connection to the rest," Woonpioniers added.

This feeling of lightness is enhanced by Light House's material finishes, with pine planks used to line the walls and ceilings in areas with a connection to the outdoors and pale gypsum plaster in the more intimate internal spaces.

Previous projects by Woonpioniers include a home in Olst, which was designed using as many bio-based materials as possible, and a prefabricated wooden cabin with large windows and tall curving interiors.

The photography is courtesy of Woonpioniers.

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Architecture studio Snøhetta has completed the renovation of Théâtre Nanterre-Amandiers in France, unifying its performance spaces around a tilted glass hall that overlooks a landscaped plaza.

The theatre in the Paris suburb of Nanterre dates back to the 1965 Festival de Nanterre, when it began life as a circus tent and subsequently a temporary warehouse. The permanent building was designed in 1976 by the architect Jacques Kalisz.

Snøhetta won a competition to update Théâtre Nanterre-Amandiers in 2018, thanks to its proposal to upgrade its existing venues, add a new 200-seat auditorium and reconfigure its public spaces with a focus on flexibility and natural light.

At the centre of the renovation is The Grand Hall, a fully-glazed, multipurpose space that overlooks a newly-created sunken courtyard and planting designed in collaboration with landscape studio Atelier Silva Landscaping.

"The rehabilitation project is neither a rupture nor a spectacular gesture, but a careful transformation aimed at preserving the essence of the place while firmly situating it in the present day," said Snøhetta.

"The intervention responds to the evolution of artistic practices, uses, and audience expectations, while renewing the dialogue between the theatre, the city, and the park," it added.

"The themes of materiality and transparency run throughout the project, serving a building that is clear, legible, and strongly connected to its context."

The Grand Hall maintains the footprint of the theatre's previous foyer, expanded with a new roof and sunken floor that allows access from both the upper forecourt and lower stepped plaza.

A mezzanine area above the hall's flexible double-height spaces provides additional access into the auditoria, while a ceiling with integrated stage equipment enables the entire space to be transformed into an additional performance or meeting venue.

Snøhetta used a "deliberately restrained" palette of concrete, wood and glass for these public areas, with the intention of creating warm, robust spaces and surfaces that would reflect the changing light through the fully-glazed walls.

"Transparency, omnipresent throughout the space, changes the perception of the building throughout the day and seasons, making the theatre’s energy visible and supporting its mission of artistic transmission and dissemination," said the studio.

"By day, natural light animates the volumes and reveals the raw materials; by night, the hall is illuminated, transforming the theatre into an urban lantern," it added.

Théâtre Nanterre-Amandiers's main 800-seat auditorium has been entirely overhauled, with the creation of accessible entrances, technical upgrades and improved sightlines. Curtains allow the size of the theatre to be reduced if needed.

Two additional performance spaces include an updated flexible auditorium with mobile seating and motorised platforms, and a new 200-seat auditorium for more intimate and experimental performances with a motorised telescopic seating system.

"These three auditoriums, rationally organised with dressing rooms, team workspaces, and circulation areas, form a compact and legible ensemble where each space is directly accessible and fully functional," said the studio.

Snøhetta recently won a competition to design the new Ontario Science Centre alongside Hariri Pontarini Architects, and is among a number of studios announced to be working on a new masterplan for Istanbul's northern Beykoz district.

The photography is by Jared Chulski.

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London studio Office S&M has used cork as cladding, insulation and flooring in this mansard extension to a house in Walthamstow, which is enlivened by bright yellow details.

Aptly named Cork Loft, the extension has created space for an additional bedroom and bathroom, marking the first phase of a wider renovation of the Victorian terraced home.

The homeowners tasked Office S&M with prioritising sustainability in its material choices, which led the studio to "exploring how far cork could go" and using it to replace traditional building materials wherever possible.

"Through detailed research, we explored how cork could replace conventional materials," founders Catrina Stewart and Hugh McEwen told Dezeen.

"[Cork] is harvested without felling trees, supports biodiversity and sequesters carbon. It is biodegradable, recyclable and formed without synthetic glues. It also provides strong thermal and acoustic insulation, resists moisture and mould, and requires minimal maintenance," they continued.

"The intention was to prove that low carbon construction can be expressive, colourful and full of character."

The exterior of Cork Loft is clad in a striped pattern of light and dark shades, created by prototyping several different cork treatments with consultants Materials Assemble to understand how they would age differently over time.

This is also reflected in the interior, where the bedroom floor has been finished in a diagonal pattern of alternating dark and light cork stripes.

Rough plasterwork on the walls echoes the rough finish of these cork surfaces, contrasted by a datum of pale blue paint that runs throughout the interior, expanding to cover entire walls of the bathroom, accompanied by mosaic tiling.

A large window in Cork Loft's bedroom frames the tree canopies outside, while the bathroom features a porthole-style window and a rooflight above the shower for an "open sky bathing experience".

These openings have been finished with bold yellow frames, matched externally by the extension's guttering and internally by a bright yellow staircase connecting it to the main home.

"A large rectangular window acts like a cinema screen overlooking the garden, while a circular bathroom window introduces a playful moment," said Stewart and McEwen.

"Yellow detailing draws light and movement upwards through the house, creating a strong vertical link between old and new," they added.

Elsewhere in London, ROAR Architects previously upgraded the thermal performance of a 1970s home in Tottenham by completely wrapping its exterior in mottled panels of expanded cork.

Other architecture projects that make use of cork include House in Valongo, which Atelier Local designed to "feel larger than it actually is", and the Casa Pádel apartment block by Núñez Ribot.

The photography is by French + Tye.

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Local studio Proctor & Shaw looked to Mallorcan villas to create a feeling of calmness at Stone Brick House, a London home extended with walls of pale limestone brick.

The terraced house was updated for a young family in Clapham and expanded with a new kitchen and dining space overlooking the garden.

According to Proctor & Shaw founder John Proctor, "airy Mallorcan villas" were a key influence on the design, informing its pale, natural material palette, which revolves around the use of low-carbon limestone bricks.

"The Can Lis house in Mallorca by Danish architect Jørn Utzon became a key precedent, and we sought to achieve a similar purity with material restraint and craft using muted natural clay plaster tones, oak and limestone brick," he told Dezeen.

"The stone brick was pivotal. It honestly expresses the construction, gifts a light reflective tone to the space and importantly provides high levels of thermal mass that assist the environmental temperance," he added.

"But perhaps most importantly, it is an ultra-low carbon construction product using about 93 per cent less embodied carbon than fired clay bricks."

Sinking the floor level of Stone Brick House's extension enabled a generous 2.9-metre ceiling height, which creates a feeling of spaciousness in tandem with a full-height sliding door into the garden and a large skylight above the dining table framed by thin oak beams.

The steps down into the extension are framed by bespoke oak storage containing a pantry. This wraps around the corner to become a backdrop to the kitchen, a long counter and a wooden island.

Opposite, a custom dining table sits alongside a built-in bench against a brick wall. The bench extends to become a window seat overlooking a planted bed in the garden.

Complementing the expanses of limestone brick are walls of natural plaster and a terracotta tiled floor underfoot, which extends out to become the garden patio.

"Providing space for entertaining was a key brief requirement, so the dining table, associated seating, kitchen counter and kitchen island are all generous," Proctor said.

"All the elements come together here; volumetric generosity, high levels of natural light, and serene material authenticity create a powerfully tranquil space," he added.

"Of particular note is the custom kitchen island with expressed simple timber frame construction and open shelves and drawers creating an airy, joyful central piece of furniture."

In the existing home, the front room and hallway have been opened up through the introduction of sliding wooden doors, allowing light and views along the entire depth of its plan.

Other London extensions completed by Proctor & Shaw include one in Peckham, which is topped by a tiered allotment, and another in north London designed as a timber-framed "sanctuary for wellbeing".

The photography is by Ståle Eriksen.

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French studio In Sinu Architectes has renovated and extended a woodland house in France, adding large windows to frame painting-like views of the surroundings.

The home is named Maison de l'Orée, or House at the Edge, after its position on the edge of the Fontainebleau forest – a landscape to the southeast of Paris made famous by painters including Paul Cezanne and Théodore Rousseau.

Despite its picturesque setting, the existing home did not address the woodland, and so In Sinu Architectes was tasked with opening it up to these natural surroundings.

The local studio added two extensions to creat e a U-shaped plan that hugs the forest, with large windows framing what it termed "living tableaux" of the landscape.

"The main challenge was to intervene delicately within this strong natural context, opening the building to the forest while maintaining balanced proportions and controlled views," studio founders Cassandre Verdier and Elena Cadouin told Dezeen.

"The extensions were positioned with the existing trees as a key constraint, ensuring that none were removed," they added.

"One of the major gestures of the project lies in the design of the openings, conceived as frames onto the forest and creating living tableaux, echoing the iconic Impressionist paintings inspired by the Fontainebleau forest."

The two timber-framed extensions connect to either end of the existing structure. One of these contains a study and continues the gabled roof of the existing house, while the other contains a dining area finished with a flat roof.

These extensions flank a small courtyard created at the centre of the home, where a formerly blank wall has been replaced with a row of glass doors that connect the central living space directly to the forest.

Both the old and new parts of the home have been united with timber cladding, with latticework sections introduced at the tops of windows and in the new gable end to allow light to filter in during the day and out at night.

Inside, the living area is organised around a fireplace built from a large slab of local Fontainebleau sandstone, accompanied by custom-made wooden furniture pieces intended to echo the textures and colours of the trees outside.

These furnishings are contrasted by a stainless steel kitchen island that was introduced to "reflect the light and movement" of the trees through the home's large, black metal window frames.

"The project brings together architecture, interior spaces, and furniture in a continuous and sensitive expression," said Verdier and Cadouin.

"The custom-made furniture pieces strengthen the intimate connection between the house and its site."

Elsewhere in France, local studio Hauvette & Madani recently completed a home in Paris with wood-lined interiors and large windows overlooking a garden, while MXarchitecture created back-to-back homes in a Parisian suburb that have "adjustable envelopes".

The photography is by Jean-Baptiste Thiriet.

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Local practice Architecture for London and interiors studio Hamish Vincent Design have revamped a neo-Georgian house in London, organising its interior around a triple-height stairwell.

Located in the Canonbury Conservation Area, Islington House has been updated with a skylit rear extension containing a kitchen and dining room and an additional ensuite bedroom on the second floor.

The home sits within a Georgian-style terrace built to replace bomb-damaged historic structures, meaning it was not heritage-listed like many of its neighbours. This gave Architecture for London and Hamish Vincent Design creative freedom to establish an open-plan layout that the homeowners desired.

However, throughout, elements have been designed to honour the original building's neo-Georgian style, including the cantilevered staircase at the home's entrance and a large brick archway that opens the rear extension onto the garden.

"The terraces on St Paul's Road are unique as modern replacements for bomb-damaged historic terraces, although they were built with Georgian-inspired design details," said Architecture for London founder Ben Ridley.

"Our refurbishment and extension develop this theme further, incorporating contemporary detailing that might make a Georgian craftsperson proud: structural arches, a cantilevered staircase, natural stone, and high-quality joinery," he added.

Entry to Islington House is via the new triple-height stairwell, which was introduced to pull more light into the formerly dark front of the home. The staircase itself has been finished with Douglas fir treads with stone details.

On the ground floor, a set of sliding double doors leads from the stairwell into the living area, which subsequently steps down into the rear extension.

Here, two exposed-brick walls frame the dining and kitchen space, where a solid wooden table with bench seating sits beneath a glass ceiling framed by timber beams.

Doors set within the large arched opening connect the dining area to a paved patio in the garden, which is flanked by grey-brick walls to match the extension.

Inside Islington House, the areas of exposed brickwork are contrasted with full-height timber storage areas and clay-plaster walls in the kitchen spaces, as well as stone-topped counters and an island.

"As a studio, we are always exploring materials, their texture, and how they are not just pleasing to look at, but also purposeful," Hamish Vincent Design's creative director Daniel Jones told Dezeen.

"The clay plaster used in the kitchen and entrance hallway void is a perfect example of this. It almost acts as a living wall, with colour and texture shifting throughout the day, while functioning as a diffuser that disperses sunlight," he added.

On the first floor, the main bedroom and bathroom sit alongside a guest room at the front of the home, while a study and bathroom space above was tucked beneath the home's roof by adjusting its floor levels.

Elsewhere in London, James Alder Architects recently revamped a terraced home with an extension for bicycle maintenance and gardening, while DGN Studio used sandstone bricks to add textural walls to a family home.

The photography is by Leighton James.

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Full-height windows framed by sculptural panels of glass-reinforced concrete overlook two stacked courtyards at Mozart House, a London home extended by local practice Studio Dera.

Located in the Belgravia Conservation Area, the Georgian terraced home is famous for being both the site where Mozart composed his first symphony at eight years old and later as the home of author Vita Sackville-West and politician Harold Nicolson.

Studio Dera was asked to create additional living space for the client, expanding an existing one-bedroom extension at the end of the home's garden.

This included transforming the volume of a former basement pool into an additional bedroom, excavating further to create a small lounge overlooking a sunken courtyard.

"The deep rear garden gave us the opportunity to think of the project as part of the landscape, rather than as a conventional extension," Studio Dera co-founder Marcel Rahm told Dezeen.

"Matching the volume of the former pool for the extension allowed us to get bold and creative with the extension while still allowing the Georgian house to retain its presence," he added.

Studio Dera described the layout of the home, moving from the living area of the main home into a glazed link corridor that runs along the edge of the garden, as an "episodic journey".

Full-height sliding doors open onto an upper courtyard, with a staircase leading down into the lower courtyard. This sunken space sits adjacent to the ne lounge space and the dining room within the original home opposite.

Above the excavated area, the ground-floor bedroom volume was designed to feel like a garden pavilion, with a narrow, deep-set frame surrounding a large set of sliding glass doors that link it directly to the courtyard.

"We were interested in the new work feeling like an extension of the domestic garden landscape, at moments almost becoming a landscape itself," said Rahm.

"The excavation grounds the project in the site, and the lighter pavilion elements bring openness and repose," Rahm added.

"The sculptural glass-reinforced concrete (GRC) intervention – particularly the light pavilion of the new bedroom at the rear – helps balance the weight of excavation with a more delicate architectural presence."

Both courtyards are paved, with large round planters potted with trees and shrubs. In the upper courtyard, areas of translucent walk-on glass provide natural light for the lounge and bedroom below.

Inside, finishes have been chosen to feel "timeless, tactile and robust", with travertine, timber and textured lime plaster echoing the sculptural GRC elements of the exterior.

Elsewhere in London, architecture studio Pinzauer recently extended the former home of Anna Freud, the daughter of Sigmund Freud, adding similarly pavilion-like, concrete-framed spaces overlooking its rear garden.

Other London house extensions recently featured on Dezeen include Komorebi by ConForm, which uses perforated floors to filter light, and Druid Grove by CAN, which features cave-like openings and green timber tendrils.

The photography is by Lorenzo Zandri.

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Local architect Pablo Sanchez Lopez focused on the idea of thresholds for this London house extension, creating a timber-framed porch at the entrance and a large pivot door leading to the garden.

Named House in Walthamstow, the Victorian terraced home had been subject to what Pablo Sanchez Lopez described as an "insensitive redevelopment" in the 1970s, leading to an awkward layout and incongruous PVC windows.

Aiming to improve the sense of connection between the home, the street and its rear garden, Lopez created a single, uninterrupted route through its ground floor, beginning with a timber-framed porch and ending in a large pivot door that opens onto a patio.

"Rather than reconstructing lost Victorian details, the project focuses on the idea of the threshold," Lopez told Dezeen.

"It rethinks the house's relationship with both the street and the garden, and how one moves from outside to inside," he added.

"Through contemporary design, the project explores physical and atmospheric transitions, interpreting the threshold as a spatial and experiential device."

House in Walthamstow's staircase, which had previously bisected the dining and living areas and blocked the axis to the garden, has been repositioned to the eastern edge of the plan, where it now faces the entrance.

This gave rise to a singular, large ground-floor space, beginning with a dining area overlooking the front yard through the new porch windows. This leads through a green-toned central kitchen into a skylit lounge created by expanding the rear of the home to the side.

On the first floor, the relocation of the staircase also allowed for a reconfigured two-bedroom layout, alongside a larger bathroom and a home office.

A full-height red curtain allows the dining room to be closed off from the entrance area and porch windows, while at the back of the home, the pivot door opens out onto a concrete-paved garden patio.

"This curtain acts as a 'soft hallway' between the entrance and living space," explained Lopez.

"Instead of building rigid partitions, the curtain's ephemeral nature allows merging or dividing the space, creating openness or intimacy, introducing light and views, or providing shading and privacy," he added.

The porch, staircase, window frames and exposed ceiling rafters were all made using the same red grandis timber used to clad the entrance porch, complemented on the ground floor by terrazzo flooring.

This is contrasted with additional green details that pick up on the tone of the kitchen, including a painted steel I-beam above the lounge and a datum of green tiles in the first-floor bathroom.

Other London extensions recently featured on Dezeen include the renovation of a home in Dulwich by ConForm Architects, which features a central, skylit void, and Nimtim Architects' playful transformation of a Victorian terrace house for Dezeen editor Tom Ravenscroft.

The photography is by Lorenzo Zandri.

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A large red roof and patterned red-brick walls were informed by ancient clay ovens discovered on the site of this sports pavilion in Willowdale, Sydney, completed by local studio Sam Crawford Architects.

Named Willowdale Sports Precinct, the pavilion is located in the southwestern suburb of Willowdale, an area rapidly densifying due to the upcoming Western Sydney Airport, and provides a clubroom, kiosk, changing rooms, toilets and a barbecue area for the surrounding community.

Sam Crawford Architects' design concept emerged after archaeological investigations, including the discovery of ancient clay ovens, revealed that the land had been used as a gathering place for millennia.

"Through archaeological investigations, the client uncovered evidence of more than 10,000 years of habitation," associate director Gabrielle Pelletier told Dezeen.

"The creek line running through the site was a meeting place for the Darug and Dharawal peoples, somewhere to trade, gather and share meals," she added.

"Ten millennia later, our brief was surprisingly similar: to design a pavilion where families and sports teams could gather, rest in the shade and share a BBQ."

Willowdale Sports Precinct is organised across a single storey, with an angled footprint that hugs the northwestern corner of a large neighbouring sports field.

Two separate volumes – one containing the clubroom and changing areas, and the other bathrooms – are connected by an expansive external terrace.

This terrace steps down to provide spectator seating to the south and forms a barbecue area to the east.

The brick walls that surround these volumes are finished with patterns designed by local design studio Lymesmith in consultation with the Darug and Dharawal peoples, and coloured with shades of "fire, clay and ash".

"Lymesmith was inspired by those ovens and the clay heat beads used for cooking within them, embedding cultural narrative directly into the architecture," explained Pelletier.

"Working with four different brick types, striated patterns across the façades culminate in a mural addressing the central covered space," she added.

Overhead, a large red roof with an angular "folded form" shelters both the internal volumes and the surrounding terraces, perched on red-painted steel supports that form a colonnade around the precinct's edge.

Facing the suburbs, this roof features a large gable end of perforated metal that acts as a beacon at night, while facing the sports pitch, it lowers in height.

Clusters of circular skylights puncture this roof above the pavilion's open gathering spaces, creating pools of light that move throughout the day, which Pelletier says "children – and adults– joyfully jump between".

To the east of the main pavilion, a parking area sits alongside a playground and a secondary, smaller sports field.

Sam Crawford established his eponymous Sydney-based studio in 1999. The studio previously completed a community pavilion in Sydney's Hurlstone Memorial Reserve with a roof wrapped in screens of red metal mesh.

Elsewhere, the studio recently reorganised a 1950s Sydney home around a multifunctional staircase with nooks for sitting and relaxing.

The photography is by Brett Boardman.

Project credits:

Client: Stockland and Campbelltown City Council
Landscape architect and lead consultant: Aspect Studios
Accessibility: Morris Golding Access Consulting
BCA consultant: GRS Building Reports
Structural and civil engineer: Lindsay Dynan
Ecology consultant: Eco Logical Australia
Hydraulic/ fire/ electrical engineer: Northrop Consulting Engineers
Integrated art: Lymesmith
Irrigation consultant: Hydroplan
PCA: Hackett Certification
Quantity surveyor: MBM
Contractor: RELD Group + Landscape Solutions

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Local studios Jaime Prous Architects and Pineda & Monedero have completed Casa 144º, a corrugated metal-clad home near Barcelona that is raised above a steeply sloping site on skinny steel stilts.

Located in the county of Maresme east of Barcelona's centre, the home on a sloping site at the base of a forested mountain range was designed for a retired couple that desired an escape from the city.

Looking to minimise the impact on the landscape and avoid felling any trees, the studios designed the home to feel "almost temporary in its presence". They designed a single, elongated volume that was sunk into the hill at one end and raised on stilts at the other.

"Most neighbouring houses aim to occupy the maximum possible surface area, significantly transforming the landscape," the studios told Dezeen.

"In contrast, despite its distinctive appearance, our proposal seeks a respectful insertion, minimising modification of the topography and avoiding the felling of any of the surrounding pine trees," they continued.

"We wanted to approach the project in the spirit of the architects who developed the Case Study Houses in the hills of Los Angeles in the 1960s – using cantilevers, steel structures, and large expanses of glass- to propose a new way of living."

"The steep slope allowed the house to hover above the terrain, reinforcing its lightweight character while preserving the continuity of the landscape beneath it," they added.

Designed for aging-in-place, the majority of the home is on a single level, with a rectilinear form that bends at a 144 degree angle to orient the living room towards sea views, giving the project its name of Casa 144º.

This bright, open living space acts as the culmination of a more enclosed entry route at the home's western end, where a narrow corridor connects two south-facing bedrooms and a kitchen.

"Upon entering, two large windows allow the eye to pass through the living space and extend towards the sea in the distance," the architects told Dezeen.

"This sequence reinforces the idea of the house as a weightless, almost transient object within the landscape," they added.

Supporting the eastern end of the home is a slender galvanised steel structure that was stiffened with cross-bracing to elevate it above a steep drop in the landscape.

Atop this steelwork, the home was built from a balloon-framed timber structure, with the roof beams left exposed internally. These beams were complemented by white walls and floors and fittings in dark timber.

At the far western end of the home, a spiral staircase leads down to a small concrete-lined basement that was required for the home's foundations, and currently serves as a workshop space.

Elsewhere in Barcelona, Rául Sánchez Architects recently completed a home on a similarly sloping site, which was raised atop concrete columns and finished in a deep shade of burnt orange.

The photography is by Del Rio Bani.

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A cluster of white gabled volumes that represent a village demolished during the Holocaust make up The Lost Shtetl Jewish Museum, completed by Finnish architecture studio Lahdelma & Mahlamäki Architects in Lithuania.

Located in Šeduva, the museum is named after a shtetl – a Yiddish word for small towns of predominantly Ashkenazi Jews, which once existed in Eastern Europe.

It pays homage to the Šeduva shtetl, which was destroyed by the Nazis during the Holocaust, with 664 of its inhabitants executed in the surrounding forests.

The director of The Lost Shtetl Jewish Museum approached Lahdelma & Mahlamäki Architects (LMA) to design the building following the studio's work on the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw, which opened in 2013.

Across 4,900 square metres, the museum hosts exhibition areas, a library, an events space and a cafe, housed within a series of abstract white "houses".

These volumes match the scale of the surrounding farmhouses, aiming to memorialise the former settlement.

"The core concept was to recreate a destroyed village – a shtetl – as a kind of dreamscape that would serve not only as a museum but also as a memorial to Holocaust victims," LMA co-founder Rainer Mahlamäki told Dezeen.

"The building is located in the countryside and takes its modest scale from local farmhouses. The museum is surrounded by a new, lush park, just as farmhouses in the middle of fields are surrounded by trees," he added.

The entrance to The Lost Shtetl Jewish Museum sits alongside a memorial wall, where a wooden grid is filled with handblown glass blocks bearing the names of all 294 shtetls that existed in Lithuania before world war two.

Inside, each of the individual volumes is connected by short corridors. The ground floor of the museum contains a library, educational spaces and multipurpose areas organised around a reception, with steep roof pitches and skylights overhead.

Above, administration areas have been inserted into the upper level of the largest central volume, while the main exhibition areas sit on a lower level.

These lower-level rooms tell the story of life both in the Šeduva shtetl and other shtetls in Eastern Europe. A narrow, canyon-like space tells the story of the Holocaust, ending in a stone memorial wall carved with the names of victims from the Šeduva shtetl.

The exhibition route culminates in a tall white space named the Canyon of Hope, which frames the surrounding countryside through a full-height glazed opening.

Public spaces are finished with a "warm" and "tranquil" palette of oak and pale quartzite stone. LMA described this as a deliberate departure from "the pathos and roughness of materials characteristic of many monuments".

Externally, the gabled volumes are clad in scale-like panels of white, slightly textured aluminium, with window shutters and entrance reveals finished in timber to echo the surrounding farmhouses.

"The materials are simple: metal, wood, and stone," explained Mahlamäki. "The colour scheme of the facade is light but chameleon-like: the light aluminium resembles grey farmhouses and, when viewed from a distance, blends into the sky in all weather conditions."

The landscape surrounding The Lost Shtetl Jewish Museum has been turned into a memorial park, which includes a birch alley, flower meadows, wetlands and an orchard, connected by a winding path and dotted with a series of larch shelters.

Other museums in Lithuania recently featured on Dezeen include the Science Island Museum in Kaunas by Australian practice SMAR Architecture Studio, which is topped with a large, tilted aluminium disc, and Studio Libeskind's MO Museum, which is punctured by skylights and stairways.

The photography is by Kuvatoimisto Kuvio unless stated otherwise.

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Blocky volumes clad in sand-toned bricks define the Sædalen Kirke church, designed by local practices Koht Arkitekter and Hille Melbye for a young congregation in Bergen, Norway.

Named Sædalen Kirke after the neighbourhood in which it is located, the 1,200-square-metre church sits on a low hill adjacent to a wooded meadow.

Koht Arkiteker and Hille Melbye designed a building that is unified externally but divisible internally via a folding partition wall that separates a double-height hall from community and activity spaces, responding to the church's role as both a religious and community gathering space.

"The brief asked for a modern church adapted to a young, growing congregation, but one that also builds on tradition and the particular identity of Sædalen as a place," Anders Olivarius Bjørneseth, studio partner at Koht Arkitekter told Dezeen.

"This is arguably the central challenge facing church architecture today – how to design a building that holds the gravity of the sacred while genuinely serving the rhythms of contemporary community life," he added.

"We read it as a challenge of balance: between the sacred and the everyday, between architectural ambition and material modesty, between the building as a landmark and the building as a good neighbour."

Two axes forming a crucifix organise the plan. The first, running from northwest to southeast, forms a "processional route" from the stepped entrance plaza, through the community space called the "church square" and into the light-filled double-height hall.

The second perpendicular axis allows these spaces to be divided, with separate entrances when required, using a folding wooden partition wall at the ground-floor level and a curtain above, where the first floor can overlook the main hall from a balcony.

For larger events, the two spaces can be combined to almost double the capacity of the church hall.

"The church square is the heart of the building, furnished for varied settings to accommodate everything from post-service coffee to independent community use," Bjørneseth said.

"Beyond the folding wall, the nave is oriented towards the altar, with daylight entering from multiple sources – skylights, a side window along the east-west axis and a large, high-placed side window – creating a layered, atmospheric quality of light," he added.

Along its southwestern facade, the church is buffered from the road by a service zone, which includes a kitchen and cloakroom for the community area and sacristy spaces.

This arrangement allows the opposite facade to open up towards the neighbouring wood and stream with large windows, as well as an outdoor seating terrace that connects to the entrance plaza.

Pale sand-toned brickwork was used both externally and internally to create a "cohesive whole" for the building, which is varied by the introduction of small perforated sections in the hall.

In the double-height church hall, this brickwork forms a lower datum, while the upper sections have been finished in pale plasterwork beneath timber ceilings.

Two bespoke tapestries by textile artist Kari Dyrdal hang in the interiors - one behind the altar that is based on an old stone wall close to the church and another in the sacristy informed by a nearby stream.

"Brick in a sand-bleached tone was chosen early in the process as the primary material, motivated by a desire for permanence, weight and tactile richness appropriate to a church on a hilltop," explained Bjørneseth.

Other churches recently featured on Dezeen include Tiny Church Tolvkanten in Copenhagen by Julius Nielsen, designed as a 12-sided form symbolising the twelve apostles and cloaked in black timber planks, and Højvangen Church in Skanderborg by Henning Larsen, which aims to balance the community and spiritual needs of a contemporary church.

The photography is by Thurston Empson.

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An extension built from timber, glass and limestone unites a 19th-century farmhouse with an adjacent barn at this home in Somerset, overhauled by London architecture studio Forgeworks.

Named House of Blue Lias after a local variety of limestone used for the project, the home is set among the Mendip Hills, which are designated an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

The homeowners tasked Forgeworks with bringing a sense of cohesion to the site, which comprised a 19th-century stone farmhouse and a neighbouring barn that had been poorly converted and suffered from damp.

Alongside the updating of this barn, the studio added a linking volume to stitch the two buildings together, creating a 25-metre-long axis around a central stone hearth.

"The site is typical of rural conversions – historic fabric, inconsistent upgrades, and no clear spatial hierarchy," Forgeworks director Chris Hawkins told Dezeen.

"The challenge was to bring order without over-designing," he added. "Rather than treating the farmhouse and barn as two separate buildings, we designed a new link structure that reoriented the entire property around a shared centre."

"It creates clarity where there was fragmentation and makes the house function as a single home," said Hawkins.

The clients' appreciation for American mid-century architecture informed the low-lying, horizontal form of the linking volume.

This is lined with five sliding glass panels that open it out onto a swimming pool terrace.

A thick wall bookending the barn end of the linking volume, a central hearth and chimney have all been finished in Blue Lias stone - the project's namesake - that was chosen to match the palette of the original farmhouse.

The stone is teamed with timber and stainless steel finishes, chosen for their tactility and durability.

"The aim was permanence without heaviness," Hawkins explained.

"Stone grounds the building in its context, timber brings warmth and rhythm, stainless steel adds a quiet precision. Materials were chosen for their tactile quality, durability, and ability to age well."

Within the barn itself, Forgeworks stripped the interiors back to the stone walls, introducing new insulation, solar panels and air source heat pumps.

Externally, a pale rendered finish ties in the barn with the farmhouse opposite.

The barn now houses additional bedrooms and bathrooms as well as a playroom, study and garage for the client's vintage cars.

Forgeworks was founded by Hawkins in 2021 and is based in London and Wiltshire. Previous projects by the studio include the renovation of a 1960s bungalow in Bath.

Other farmhouse renovations on Dezeen include A Place in the Country, which Studio Ben Allen finished with a playful colour scheme, and the "hairy" Church Cottage extension by James Grayley Architecture.

The photography by French & Tye.

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Local studio Waelgaard Salim Arkitekter has completed House Grimstad, a barn-like dwelling in Norway that contrasts black tar-stained timber cladding with warm interiors lined in spruce.

The 160-square-metre building was designed as a holiday home for a family of four on a site surrounded by fruit trees and farms on the outskirts of the town of Grimstad.

Working with a small footprint and a limited budget, Waelgaard Salim Arkitekter looked to demonstrate how a deliberately simple form and material palette can create generous, warm-feeling spaces.

"The project began with a simple question: how little do we need to build in order to create a generous home?" founders Siri Waelgaard and Alexander Minge Salim told Dezeen.

"As a young practice, this project became a test of reduction. We asked ourselves how far we could simplify without losing generosity," they added.

"We wanted to make a low-cost house that still feels rich, not through complexity, but through light, proportion and material presence."

Spread across two storeys, the home is divided into an open-plan ground floor containing living, dining, kitchen and study areas, and a more compartmentalised first floor housing bedrooms.

The U-shaped ground floor wraps a central, timber-lined stair and bathroom core, with a double-height dining space that is illuminated by a skylight and opens onto a garden terrace.

Strategically-placed windows of different sizes ensure each space has a relationship to the surrounding garden, ranging from a horizontal window in the kitchen, a large square opening for a reading corner and a tall, skinny window on the landing.

The glue-laminated timber (glulam) structure has been left exposed throughout the interiors of House in Grimstad, accompanied by walls and ceilings lined entirely in spruce ergoboard.

While often covered, this exposed boarding was chosen as a cost-effective way to create a warm atmosphere and as a material that a single carpenter could easily handle during construction.

Externally, the pale tone of these boards is contrasted by planks of dark, tar-stained heartwood pine that will weather over time.

Concrete floors were used on the home's ground floor and solid pine boards for the first floor, while the roof is topped with asphalt rolls.

"The intention was to use materials that are strong, natural and able to withstand time without constant maintenance," said Waelgaard and Salim.

"We tried to avoid layered finishes and instead allowed the construction to remain visible," they added. "Aging is not something to resist, but something to welcome."

Elsewhere in Norway, architecture practice Rever & Drage recently expanded a traditional red-painted home in Raelingen, using a matching red palette of timber, brick and steel, and Rabagast Studio created Watercave, a timber sauna that floats on a lake.

The photography is courtesy of Waelgaard Salim Architects.

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The casings of woodland seeds such as chestnuts and pinecones informed the openable facade of this pod-like pavilion in the Netherlands, designed by local architecture practice Walden Studio.

Named Bolster after the Dutch term de bolster, meaning a husk or shell, the timber pavilion was designed and built by Walden Studio in Trompenburg Arboretum near Rotterdam for an educational urban food forest called Voedselbos De Overtuin.

Housed within the structure's pod-like form is storage for tools, a sink, a compostable toilet and benches. All of these functions are concealed behind timber panels that open upwards to double as canopies for shelter in the small clearing.

"We looked at protective shells, husks and seed capsules – that idea of something that closes and then opens again, that protective character, was what intrigued us," Walden Studio founders Laurens van der Wal and Sebastiaan van Kints told Dezeen.

"When open, it welcomes visitors and offers shelter and basic functions that were lacking in this part of the forest," added Van der Wal and Van Kints.

"When closed, rather than reading as an empty building, it becomes a compact wooden object that withstands the elements and protects what is inside."

The structure and cladding of Bolster was made from oak sourced sustainably on the site, with the dimensions of these trees informing the size of the pavilion's angled trusses and cladding planks.

These trusses are visible at each corner of the pavilion's hexagonal plan and divide its different functional spaces. Each of these is covered by one of the external timber panels, which incorporate gas springs to allow them to be opened by hand.

"This simple action makes the pavilion feel less like a static object and more like something that changes with time, weather and daily use – almost like a flower opening towards the sun," said Van der Wal and Van Kints.

"It means that activities happen in the forest itself rather than inside a conventional building, maintaining contact with nature for anyone coming here to have a cup of tea or wash the harvest," they added.

Other elements of the pavilion were either salvaged or recycled, including floor beams made from discarded window frames, timber sheets from a fire-damaged construction site and a rooflight made using plastic from an old highway barrier.

Another woodland pavilion featured on Dezeen is Field Station, an open-air laboratory for ecological study that was made from foraged wood by students at the Architectural Association.

At Kew Gardens in London, Mizzi Studio recently created a mushroom-like pavilion with a translucent roof made using flax.

The photography is by Anna Odulinska.

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Corrugated metal cloaks the long, narrow form of An Unfinished House, a minimalist house in Japan designed by Tokyo studio Kraft Architects.

Located on a leftover plot in the suburbs of Isesaki City, Gunma Prefecture, the home was created for the family of a local carpenter, who worked closely with Kraft Architects to design and build its timber-framed structure.

Kraft Architects made a feature of the long, narrow site, organising the home as a sequence of rooms that lead seamlessly into one another, lined with full-height vertical windows on either side.

"The site is characterised by clearly articulated yet overlapping scales – residential neighbourhoods, farmland and distant mountains – forming a layered environment," lead architects Atsushi Nakamura and Hirari Sato told Dezeen.

"The elongated volume is placed horizontally to engage these layered views, allowing everyday life to unfold alongside shifting fragments of scenery," they added.

"Rather than fixed rooms, spatial meaning emerges through movement, light and daily behaviour."

The route through An Unfinished House, dubbed the "Axis of Life" by the studio, begins to the west with a sheltered terrace that was informed by a traditional doma – a semi-outdoor space for tasks that might make the interior of the home dirty.

The entrance leads from a tatami room, through a central living, kitchen and dining room before ending with the children's space and main bedroom to the east.

In the centre of An Unfinished House, a pantry and bathrooms occupy pods on either side of the main axis, creating a narrower, corridor-like threshold between the living and bedroom spaces.

In the larger rooms, exposed timber columns act as "subtle anchors".

"A series of structural columns operates as an architectural device that organises relationships rather than defining hierarchy," said Nakamura and Sato.

"Positioned at key intersections, they act as subtle anchors that temporarily stabilise family relationships while allowing multiple centres of gravity to coexist within the space."

The exterior of An Unfinished House was clad entirely in corrugated galvalume steel panels, selected for the way they softly reflect the light of the surrounding farmland.

Its roof extends into deep eaves, shading both the rows of large windows on each side of the home and a gravel pathway around its perimeter.

Elsewhere in Japan, architecture studio Permanent recently completed an office building on a similarly long, narrow site alongside farmland, topped by a wavy corrugated metal roof informed by the swaying of rice crops in the breeze.

Other Japanese homes recently featured on Dezeen include a residence with an extension streaked with clay and House in Nakano, which is fronted by a metal terrace for potted plants.

The photography is by Takuya Seki.

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A colonnade of whole charred tree trunks supports the roof of Puusauna, a sauna and tea room in Finland designed by architect Jaakko Torvinen.

Located on the small island of Kaunissaari in the Gulf of Finland, the 30-square-metre sauna sits at the boundary where a large forest meets the beach.

Puusauna, which means Tree Sauna in English, was constructed almost entirely using trees from this neighbouring forest, which have been hand-hewn and left as whole trunks to create sculptural structural elements.

Sheltering an external terrace is a canopy supported by charred tree trunks, building on a technique used by Torvinen for his previous project, Little Finlandia – a temporary events space in Helsinki supported by load-bearing pine trunk columns.

"This is something I think is at the core of my design – using the organic shape of wood as part of the architecture," Torvinen told Dezeen.

"The trees were selected one by one from the forest according to their individual, natural forms. These trees play a central role and appear as prominent elements in the building."

Puusauna was designed as a traditional loft sauna, with washing spaces located on the ground floor and the sauna itself upstairs.

Wrapped by dovetailed log-cabin walls made from hand-hewn trunks, the sauna is organised around a batch-fired stove, which was specifically chosen for its "slow, hands-on" heating process.

A timber staircase with a whole tree trunk acting as the bannister's newel post leads up to the sauna benches, which face a large, panoramic window overlooking the ocean. A second window behind frames the forest.

"As a Finn, I sauna almost every other day and swim outdoors at least weekly – also in winter – so this deep, personal relationship with sauna culture is directly reflected in the design," said Torvinen.

"After a sequence of compressed and sheltered transitions, the visitor steps into a tall, over four-metre-high volume where an organically shaped tree trunk rises through the space and draws the gaze upward," Torvinen added.

"The architecture is intentionally restrained in how it reveals views: they only open once you sit down – first while washing, and later on the upper benches – turning the act of bathing into a slow, choreographed ritual rather than an immediate visual experience," he added.

Alongside the sauna, the 10-square metre tea room is organised around a small wood-burning stove. Its design was informed by traditional Japanese architecture and features end-grain wooden flooring and a bench that ends in another small twisting tree trunk.

Both the sauna and teahouse are wrapped by a deep timber terrace, framed by a colonnade of charred tree trunks and featuring a large boulder that Torvinen had been particularly drawn to when first visiting the site.

Other sauna projects recently featured on Dezeen include Watercave, a timber sauna that floats atop a Norwegian lake, and the Drying Shed, which Built Works created in woodland in East Sussex.

The photography is by Päivi Tuovinen.

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Rough walls streaked with clay, soil and metal powders evoke ceramic glazes at Haniyasu House, a home in Japan renovated by local architecture studio Aatismo.

Named Haniyasu House after the Japanese gods of earth, clay and pottery, the dwelling in the coastal town of Kamakura was designed for two founders of Aatismo, Keita Ebidzuka and Eriko Masunaga, and Ebidzuka's parents, both of whom are ceramic artists.

The project saw the single-storey home, originally built in 1967, stripped back to its timber frame after a typhoon had left it structurally unsound.

Aatismo extended and reinforced this existing structure by introducing four contrasting volumes at its corners, finished with a textured coating made from waste materials to create the impression that they have emerged from the earth.

"The project functions as a residence for two generations: my parents, who are ceramicists, and my wife and I, who are architects," principal designer Ebidzuka told Dezeen.

"It references the composition of a primitive settlement where life and creation are inseparable," he added.

"By supporting the frame of the existing house with earthen masses that appear to have surged from the ground, we intended to create a temporal intersection where it is unclear which existed first."

The central footprint of the existing home has been entirely given over to an atelier, living room and kitchen space, framed by the curved, textured corners of the new volumes. This opens out onto a terrace to the south through sliding glass doors.

Three of the corner volumes contain a space for each family member to both sleep and work, with the parents' rooms doubling as pottery-making spaces and the studio members' room lined with desks.

To the northeast, the fourth volume houses a tea room that doubles as a guest bedroom, with floors lined with tatami mats and a small square skylight in the centre of its ceiling.

Shaped like trapezoidal prisms with rounded edges, the extension volumes were constructed using simple timber frames insulated and clad in timber panels.

To finish these volumes, waste clay from the parents' ceramic practice was bisque-fired and layered over soil from the site, with a plaster mixed with waste iron and copper powder from a metal workshop poured over the top.

The resulting streaked layers, which evoke the process of glazing ceramics, were left exposed to create a distinctive finish that transitions from blue-green at the top through orangey browns and green-greys. Internally, each was given a rough, cave-like plaster finish.

"In mythology, Haniyasu, the Japanese deity of earth, was born from excrement," said Ebidzuka.

"We translated this mythological cycle, where new life and earth emerge from waste, into a modern architectural process by utilising industrial and domestic waste," he added.

"We actively applied ceramic techniques, such as nagashigake (glaze pouring) and the intentional oxidation of metallic powders, to introduce layers of serendipity and temporal change into the architecture."

Other recent residential projects in Japan include a home in Osaka by Akio Isshiki Architects, which is clad in planks of charred cedar and wrapped by shoji screens, and House in Nakano by HOAA, which is fronted by an elevated, looping metal terrace for potted plants.

The photography is by Shinya Sato.

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Local studio Skupaj Arhitekti has completed House on the Edge of the Plain in Slovenia, a minimalist concrete home that frames the landscape through expanses of full-height glazing.

Located on the outskirts of Murska Sobota, the home sits within the fertile green landscapes of Prekmurje – the largest plain in Slovenia – which stretches alongside the river Mur.

Skupaj Arhitekti created a low-lying, exposed-concrete home that contrasts thick, monolithic walls with generous expanses of glazing.

According to the studio, the design is a nod to both the flatness of this landscape and the notable examples of 20th-century modernism found in the nearby town, rather than what it called "unambitious" suburban buildings closeby.

"The project originates from a deliberate dialogue with the modernist legacy of Murska Sobota – a city defined by flatness, horizontality and functionalist thinking," Skupaj Arhitekti partner Tomaž Ebenšpanger told Dezeen.

"Situated at the edge of an architecturally unambitious suburban development, the house consciously refuses contextual mimicry," he added.

"Instead, it turns outward towards the open, unbuilt horizon of the Pannonian plain. Conceived as a villa for a contemporary individual or couple, it is a space of inhabitation and retreat rather than daily routine."

While the home was originally intended to be built from rammed earth, Ebenšpanger explains that both contemporary regulations and the loss of local construction knowledge led to the use of concrete made from aggregate sourced from the Mura river.

This concrete was subtly pigmented in a pale shade to "evoke the tone of clay" and cast using rough, recycled formwork that gave its exposed surfaces a rough texture.

A large freestanding storage unit in the centre of the home's plan divides a bedroom area to the north from a living, kitchen and dining area to the south, with two "cores" next to each containing a bathroom and services.

Both halves of the plan are open to the landscape – the bedroom via a full-height glazed corner, and the living area via a large sliding glass door. This is housed within a white-steel track that extends beyond the western edge of the home to frame its garden.

An entrance porch to the east and dining terrace to the south are both sheltered by thick sections of concrete roof, while to the north, a protruding white-steel gutter ends in a rain chain that channels water into the pebble garden.

"The square footprint conceals a striking clarity of organisation: only two enclosed programmes – a service core and a bathroom – alongside a generous kitchen niche and a single, fluid living space," Ebenšpanger said.

"The radically open plan dissolves the boundary between interior and exterior, while the glass envelope operates simultaneously as enclosure and as a framing device," continued Ebenšpanger.

"Privacy is not inherent but elective – activated through curtains, precisely when and how the inhabitant chooses."

Elsewhere in Slovenia, local studio OFIS Arhitekti recently reconstructed a home in the historic post-war housing development of Naselje Murgle in Ljubljana, adding a "greenhouse-like" extension overlooking its garden, and it also renovated a stone house in Avber to feel "ancient and alive".

The photography is by Ana Skobe.

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Perforated metal floorplates allow sunlight to filter deep into the interiors of Komorebi, a terraced home in London renovated by local architecture studio ConForm Architects.

Named after the Japanese concept of Komorebi – the uplifting feeling of dappled sunlight filtering through leaves – the dwelling in Dulwich was updated to create a more interconnected layout for a father and his two sons.

ConForm Architects introduced new living spaces at the rear of the home, while creating a large void crossed by areas of perforated floor to help "amplify" an existing skylight at its centre.

"For us, this project was about moving away from static rooms to create a better-connected home," the studio told Dezeen.

"The real opportunity lay with an existing, unusual central rooflight. Instead of erasing it to gain floor space, we leaned into it, extending the void upwards to create a mechanism that draws daylight deep into the plan," it added.

"By using perforated steel floorplates and open voids, we allowed light to become both structure and atmosphere, filtering it through the home so the spaces feel alive and intrinsically connected rather than separated."

The central daylit void of Komorebi separates the largely unchanged front of the home from a series of entirely new concrete-framed spaces at the rear, which the studio says "unfold in unexpected vertical and horizontal layers".

Alongside the exposed concrete frame, the brickwork that lines this daylit void was given a finish of slurried, whitewashed mortar to enhance the feeling of light and space.

On the ground floor, a newly opened-up axis passes through the central void to unite the dining, kitchen and living areas, with a lounge at the rear opening onto the garden through a large glass pivot door.

Above, a first-floor bathroom and a study sit behind the home's bedrooms, topped by an inverted-pitch roof and finished inside and out in pale brickwork.

An additional "pod room" next to the central rooflight on the second floor offers additional living space for the client's teenage boys, ending in a large timber-framed window overlooking the garden and surroundings.

A timber staircase with open treads alongside the home's central void connects each level, with its landings also given perforated metal floors.

"We utilised the existing split-levels to our advantage, knitting these zones together vertically with open stair treads and voids," said the studio.

"It means that even when doing different things on different floors, the family remains visually and audibly connected," it added.

ConForm Architects was founded in 2017 by Ben Edgley and Eoin O'Leary.

Previous projects by the studio include another extension in London that opens a flat up to its garden and a "homely" office in the brutalist Smithson Tower.

The photography is by James Retief.

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Local practice Wiercinski Studio has updated a 1930s villa in Poznań, Poland, creating a total of 45 bespoke, industrial-style fittings and furniture pieces to celebrate Polish craftsmanship.

Named P81 House, the 300-square-metre villa is located in the historic Grunwald district, an area known for its pre-war architecture. Its owners tasked Wiercinski Studio with updating the home to better suit family life.

Stripping away layers of old plaster to reveal the home's original walls established a "raw and honest" aesthetic that the studio carried throughout the project, using steel, oak and granite for a series of custom-made furniture and fittings.

"The defining moment of the renovation occurred when the owners, Karolina and Mariusz, stripped away layers of old plaster to reveal the original brickwork," said the studio.

"This raw and honest aesthetic set the tone for the entire project, allowing the villa to be restored with profound respect for its historical fabric through the careful preservation of cornices, sills, and the installation of new windows that replicate the original classical divisions."

"A hallmark of Wiercinski Studio is furnishing spaces with custom-made objects, which worked perfectly in this interior," it added.

The largest structural alteration to the home saw the removal of a central wall on the ground floor, replacing it with a large, pale green-painted steel beam to create a single, open living, kitchen and dining space.

A solid oak dining table sits alongside a granite-topped breakfast bar in the kitchen with stainless-steel stools and counters, beneath a bespoke, curtain-like fabric light fitting.

Tucked to one side is a "hidden" secondary kitchen, alongside a bathroom that is finished with a floor, windowsill and sink made from local Strzegom granite.

Opposite, the living area is defined by a long leather sofa that faces a custom steel hi-fi cabinet, next to a series of carved wood and metal side tables.

A curved, red neon light on the ceiling demarcates the space where the removed wall once stood, which has been positioned above a low steel "plant island" filled with potted plants.

All of these new additions were created to sit against the raw elements of the home's existing structure and exposed services, including wooden floors and a large expanse of rough plaster wall in the kitchen.

"The traces of the home's history remain visible throughout as original wooden floors and door frames were kept, and concrete infills in the flooring mark where old walls once stood, revealing the building's previous life as a multi-apartment villa," said the studio.

While Wiercinski Studio was originally tasked with only updating the home's interior, the decision was made to update the villa's entrance and stairwell, which have been wrapped in a new corrugated metal volume.

The home's street boundary has been wrapped by a low concrete wall with steel gates, with custom, lantern-like light fittings illuminating the path around to the side entrance.

Poznań's craft heritage also provided a reference point for design studio Holloway Li's renovation of the local Puro hotel, which aimed to provide a "layering of history" reflecting the region's changing industries and styles over the decades.

The photography is by Oni Studio.

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Indian studio Madras Spaces has completed The Threshold House, a farmhouse in Tamil Nadu built using a locally sourced palette of repurposed brick, timber and tiles.

Surrounded by agricultural fields in the small village of V Thuraiyur, the compact 93-square-metre home was the result of a simple client brief that prioritised local materials, daylight and natural ventilation.

Chennai-based Madras Spaces gave a third of the site's footprint over to a patio, wrapped by brick walls punctured by perforated openings and overlooked by a balcony shared by the first-floor bedrooms.

"The site was extremely tight, which became the primary challenge and design driver," principal architect Aswin Karthik told Dezeen.

"Although village houses are typically extroverted, this constraint led us to design a home that appears introverted from the outside, but gradually opens up and becomes extroverted within as one moves through the spaces," added Karthik.

"The ground floor is conceived as an open, seamless flow of spaces that change function over the course of the day. The central court becomes an extended living space, animated by light, air, and movement throughout the day."

Entering via the patio, both a wooden door and folding shutters lead into the home's main living space, the floor of which steps up to create a stage-like seating area leading through to a kitchen at the rear.

The Threshold House has a load-bearing brick structure that supports a concrete upper floor and roof, topped with traditional Mangalore tiles.

The majority of materials, including the home's doors and windows, were salvaged and repurposed.

Karthik describes this use of existing materials as a way of "reinforcing continuity" with the area's local building traditions and craftsmanship.

On the first floor, a monopitch section soars above a pair of bedrooms, which share access to both a balcony and a skylit bathroom and shower room.

The bedrooms are lined with white plaster walls, accompanied by sections of white-painted salvaged brickwork forming a headboard for the beds and exposed timber ceilings above.

"We tried to stay as close to the roots as possible in terms of sustainability and construction," explained Karthik. "This allowed us to engage deeply with local culture, ways of living, and local workmanship."

"The intent was not to create something that merely looks beautiful, but something that is truthful and sustainable — and therefore beautiful on its own. We used only what was necessary. Not more, not less," he added.

Other homes in India recently featured on Dezeen include Ananda, a dwelling in Kerela by Thought Parallels Architecture that reinterprets the southern Indian region's vernacular buildings, and Zenhouse, which Studio Nirvana designed to invite "calm and stillness".

The photography is by Syam Sreesylam.

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Gridded volumes of exposed concrete surround a series of courtyards at the University of Málaga's Faculty of Tourism, designed by local studio Vaillo + Irigaray Architects.

Created as part of the university's expansion of its Teatinos campus to the west of Málaga's centre, the sprawling, low-lying campus provides 22,904 square metres of teaching spaces and student facilities.

Vaillo + Irigaray Architects divided the faculty into a series of courtyard-facing forms, drawing on the long history of cloisters and courtyards in both university buildings and Mediterranean architecture.

"The project proposal aims to follow the tradition, deeply rooted in our architecture, based on a system of aggregating volumes around courtyards," studio partner Yago Vaillo Usón told Dezeen.

"The courtyard typology is common throughout the tradition of educational architecture, given that the institution of the university originated in cathedrals between the 11th and 13th centuries," he added.

The Faculty of Tourism comprises three primary volumes, positioned according to the topography of the gently sloping site, which enabled a parking level to be sunk below ground.

These rectilinear volumes are divided according to function, with each organised around a courtyard designed to have a distinct "personality". One volume contains classrooms, another houses departmental offices, while the third has an auditorium, library and cafeteria.

The classroom and office volumes both overlook gravel-lined gardens with concrete planters, while to the south, the cafeteria and auditorium overlook a paved courtyard with rows of palm trees.

Surrounding these courtyards, the external concrete grid acts as a colonnade that shades the faculty's cloister-like corridors that are lined with full-height glazing.

"Each volume is organised around a courtyard, which reinforces the personality of each space, creating a green, cool, and welcoming area around which all activity revolves, thus becoming a protected outdoor social space," Usón explained.

"A public scale closer to urban infrastructure is established," Usón continued. "The structure becomes the essential architectural element of the project, capable of organising the program and defining its image."

"The building's image is formed by an exposed, in-situ concrete structure, both interior and exterior, with very slender, 15-centimetre-thick sections."

The faculty's three volumes are united by a central hall at its heart, which was conceived as an internal courtyard. It is topped by a sawtooth, skylit roof that filters daylight through a ceiling of concrete beams.

The corridors that wrap this central space connect directly to each volume's cloister, uniting them all around a flexible, open area that can be used for events and exhibitions.

Surrounding the faculty building, a series of landscaped and paved slopes has been introduced, including a botanical garden, overlooked from perimeter windows set within the deep concrete grid.

Other university buildings recently featured on Dezeen include an engineering building for Penn State University by American studio Payette, which is wrapped in reddish brick and metal fins, and an Indian teaching building by Sanjay Puri Architects that references ancient stepped wells.

The photography is by Rubén Pérez Bescós.

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Japanese studio HOAA has completed House in Nakano, a timber-lined home in Tokyo that is buffered from the street by an elevated, looping metal terrace for potted plants.

The 96-square-metre residence in the Nakano ward was designed to act as both a studio and home for HOAA founder Hiroyuki Oinuma and his family.

Desiring spaces with garden views but restricted by the compact, built-up site, Oinuma introduced what he calls the Kazari Garden.

The Kazari Garden is a looped metal terrace for potted plants, raised on metal stilts to be visible from the first-floor living areas. It is named after a Japanese word for ornament or decoration.

"I wanted a house with large windows that open onto the garden, but the site was in a densely built-up residential area on three sides except for the road on the north side, so I decided to place the large windows and garden on the north side," Oinuma told Dezeen.

"However, north-facing windows are generally not popular in Japan as they do not let in much light and create a dark view," he continued.

"To solve this problem, I created the Kazari Garden, a looping terrace that bypasses the road to seek out sunlight by the large dining room window on the second floor, adding a sparkling glow to the view from the window."

While offering space for plants, the raised metal walkway incorporates steps that form a dedicated entrance into the first floor of House in Nakano.

Here there is a large living, dining and kitchen area, which steps up to two bedrooms at the rear of the home.

A raised, engawa-like space between the garden walkway and the living space frames a ribbon window finished with wired glass.

This is one of several industrial-style finishes throughout the interior, with others being a stainless steel counter and light fittings made from brass pipe.

On the ground floor below, HOAA's studio and workshop sit alongside an additional bedroom, overlooking a smaller back garden and a large planter beneath the home's internal stair, which is illuminated by a skylight.

Both the staircase and the living room have been lined with built-in shelving made from the same dark timber that covers the home's walls and ceilings. These shelves display the family's collection of books, ceramics, plants and photographs.

"The split-floor layout takes advantage of the difference in elevation of the site, so you can see the garden from anywhere. Simply moving around the house unfolds a lyrical landscape like a short film," said Oinuma.

"We considered cherished vessels, books, photographs and plants to be representations of our lives up to now," he added.

"By surrounding the flow of movement with shelves on which to display these items, we thought that we could create just the right amount of tension in the home, like a small art museum, and foster the motivation to live mindfully in the future."

House in Nakano is topped by a shallow-pitched metal roof that sweeps down to create a gently curved ceiling above the dining area. Externally, the home is covered in a moss green render chosen by Oinuma to reflect the surrounding planting.

Other recent residential projects in Japan include a home by Keiji Ashizawa, which is wrapped by wooden louvres and sliding shoji screens for privacy, and House in Saidera, which  Akio Isshiki Architects clad in charred cedar.

The photography is by Takuya Seki.

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Australian architecture studio Splinter Society has completed Coastal House, a minimalist home in Victoria finished in a palette of concrete, limestone, copper and hardwood designed to "age beautifully" in the harsh coastal weather.

Designed for a local builder as a development project, the family home is located in the town of Ocean Grove and occupies an elevated position that is set back from the beach.

Organised on a relatively narrow, deep plot, Splinter Society designed the layout of Coastal House to balance panoramic, south-facing views of the ocean with protection and privacy for its bedrooms.

This informed the creation of a courtyard on the home's western edge, hugged by a bedroom block to the east that is clad in hardwood and patinated copper panels to shelter it from salty sea winds.

"This house was very much about responding to context. It was about balancing the knockout southerly views over the ocean, whilst providing warm, north-facing protected spaces for a family to enjoy," Splinter Society director Chris Stanley told Dezeen.

"Of equal importance was creating a warm, natural palette that would age beautifully in this harsh coastal environment," he added.

Facing the street, the entrance of Coastal House is deep-set into a lower level clad in hardwood timber, where a passage leads between garage and storage areas and up a staircase to the living areas.

This upper level is housed within a slightly cantilevering concrete volume, where a full-height glazed facade is set within a deep, chamfered opening that provides the areas with panoramic sea views.

A rough limestone wall divides the living and dining areas, and projects outwards to form a pilaster above the entrance on the home's facade.

Connecting these living spaces to the bedrooms is a central glazed corridor overlooking the home's courtyard, where a small swimming pool is surrounded by a timber terrace.

"Our client has a love of natural materials and a passion for purchasing auction timbers and milling them himself. With a strong local knowledge, he also understands the wind-driven salt environment and was keen to collaborate," Stanley said.

"The house was designed to be quite minimal in execution to the street, and its simple form and natural palette allow it to be simultaneously bold, but also sensitive and recessive to its emerging dry climate landscape," he added.

The main bedroom and a rumpus have been tucked at the back of the site for the most privacy, where they overlook both the central courtyard and an additional strip of planting to the north.

Based in Melbourne, Splinter Society is an architecture and interior design studio led by Stanley alongside Asha Nicholas.

Previous projects by the studio include the extension and renovation of a home for a pair of avid gardeners, which maximised space and views for a lush collection of plants, and a black timber extension to a Melbourne cottage.

The photography is by Sharyn Cairns.

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Indian studio Ma+rs has completed Serenity, a wildlife retreat in Tamil Nadu crowned by a cluster of thatched roofs intended to blend in with the distant Anamalai mountain range.

Nestled within a 1.6-hectare forested plot near the village of Sethumadai, the building is part of a wider project to transform the area into a wildlife corridor, giving over half of the site for elephants, leopards and bison to roam freely.

Ma+rs reused the stone plinth of a former building on the site to support the new steel-framed structure, which is designed to have as minimal an impact on the landscape as possible.

"Our core concept for the design was to create a built space that was a quiet observer – a building that did not impose itself on the landscape," principal architects Anisha Menon and Sabyasachi Routray told Dezeen.

"Rather, it honoured all that existed and created a permeable boundary where architecture and the wildlife corridor coexist peacefully without any conflict," they added.

The layout of Serenity comprises a two-storey L-shaped block of bedrooms to the south and a large, open terrace to the north, which is flanked by a courtyard and a small swimming pool.

Its steel framework is contrasted with the exposed stonework of the plinth below and the 25-centimetre-thick thatch of the roof above, which is formed of six individual pitched volumes topped by ventilation ducts.

Designed to mimic the distant Anamalai mountain range, this roof structure creates high ceilings for Serenity's terrace, while its large eaves shelter the bedroom balconies and a dedicated viewing platform on the first floor oriented towards the forest.

For the bedroom block, the steel frame has been infilled with brickwork coated in a yellowy shade of breathable lime plaster, polished to give it what Menon and Routray described as a "luminous sheen".

"Because of the 10-inch (25-centimetre) thatch and the way we've massed the structure, the roofline camouflages perfectly with the silhouettes of the Anamalai range," Menon and Routray said.

"This realisation, that the building recedes into the mountains rather than standing out against them was the ultimate validation of our original intent."

To the east of the site, a smaller, pavilion-like structure acts as an entrance pavilion, alongside a pizza oven and dedicated dining area.

Nearby, the site's wildlife area has been supported by the creation of two ponds, formed by channelling the site's water runoff.

Another wildlife retreat recently featured on Dezeen is Suyian Lodge in Kenya, designed by Michaelis Boyd, Nicholas Plewman Architects and Fox Browne Creative to feel "deeply integrated" with its site.

Other contemporary thatched-roof buildings include the Thread cultural centre in Senegal by Toshiko Mori and the Hata-Mazanka guesthouses in Ukraine by YOD Group.

The photography is by Studio f/8.

Project credits:

Architect: Ma+rs
Design team: Indulekha Paul, Sabyasachi Routray, Anisha Menon
Project direction: Regen Space
Landscape and ecological solutions: Oikos Ecological solutions
Material consultant: Wabi Plus
Furniture and lighting design: Studio Abelha

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Greek practice Ateno Architecture Studio has completed Olen, an underground coastal hotel on the island of Syros, which is half-buried into its cliff-edge site to offer uninterrupted views across the Aegean Sea.

With a brief to create a seven-suite resort on the relatively untouched site, Athens-based Ateno Architecture Studio prioritised blending Olen into the landscape, creating a stepped form described by the studio as "amphitheatrical".

This created a contrasting mixture of open, expansive terraces and skylit, subterranean rooms set deep into the cliff edge, with the whole composition framed by walls coated in textured, earth-toned render.

"Olen is located on a remote site on the island of Syros, where the natural landscape still prevails over the built environment," Ateno Architecture Studio co-founders Elias Theodorakis and Yiorgos Fiorentinos told Dezeen.

"The core design ambition was to preserve this balance, despite the project’s brief calling for a relatively large-scale intervention," they explained.

"The project is not defined by the composition of 3D objects, but rather by the assembly of horizontal and vertical surfaces – terrace planes, retaining walls, and cuts in the terrain – allowing the architecture to read as embedded in the landscape itself."

Olen is divided into three elements, named The Plane, The Line and The Point, which step down the site, connected by a zigzagging pathway. These areas gradually increase in privacy as visitors move down the site.

The Plane occupies the highest point of the site, defined by a curved section of retaining wall that frames a large terrace with a leaf-shaped pergola and pool.

Sunk into the hill are shared living spaces and a bedroom, while three additional bedrooms sit alongside smaller terraces within cubic volumes that project out towards the sea.

"The curved retaining walls that define The Plane, together with the pergola are the most significant gestures of the project," Theodorakis and Fiorentinos said.

"The serpentine geometry of the walls organises circulation, introduces a sense of theatricality, and creates an embracing condition that offers protection while remaining open toward the horizon and the endless sea," they added.

Below, The Line contains two larger subterranean living units that can operate separately or as a larger single unit, opening onto a shared terrace with a long, narrow infinity pool.

At the end of the path down the site is The Point, an independent, subterranean guesthouse that is fronted by a curved, stone retaining wall and a small circular pool.

This exposed stonework is the only departure from the textured, earth-toned rendered walls used throughout Olen, both for retaining walls and to frame skylights that reveal the subterranean areas below the hillside.

A warm, off-white palette defines the resort's interiors, chosen to create a light and airy atmosphere despite the subterranean nature of many of its spaces.

This is complemented by light stone floors that unify the external terraces with the internal rooms and offer a cool surface underfoot during summer.

Elsewhere in Greece, architect Savvas Psathas recently designed a wellness centre in Santorini that steps down steep cliffs in the town of Oia to overlook the island's volcanic caldera.

Another half-buried building on a coastal site in Greece is NCaved, a house by Mold Architects that sits in a secluded cove.

The photography is by Yiorgis Yerolymbos.

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French architecture studio Tectoniques has completed the Dominique Frelaut School in Paris, wrapping a central courtyard with a series of stepped volumes topped by green terraces.

Located in the suburban commune of Colombes, the five-storey, 5,180-square-metre school occupies a former industrial site and provides 25 classrooms alongside a clubroom and a canteen on the top floor with panoramic views over Paris.

Looking to maximise outdoor space, Tectoniques created what it described as a "vertical school", with a tall, narrow U-shaped plan hugging a central green courtyard.

The five storeys of classrooms within each wing step backwards as they rise, topped by planted terraces that are connected by steel and concrete staircases that "cascade" all the way down to the entrance gate.

The central playground is partially sheltered by a first-floor walkway perched on concrete columns that links the school's two wings and was designed to double as a "teaching garden", with long, narrow planters.

"Presenting a clear and easily recognisable form, at once monumental and familiar, the building coils around the playground like a protective enclosure," said the studio.

"Its staggered upper floors and varied pathways create a close relationship between the architecture and the landscape," it continued. "Exterior staircases cascade down to the courtyard, linking all the terrace levels and offering an open-air path with multiple panoramic city views."

Facing the street, the school's outer facade is more enclosed, clad in alternating vertical strips of flat and convex pale ceramic tiles that were informed by the work of Finnish architect Alvar Aalto.

Large windows with narrow metal planters at their bases bring daylight into perimeter corridors connecting the classrooms, which were oriented to overlook the central courtyard through windows sheltered by metal grille awnings.

In each corner of the U-shaped plan, two helical staircases have been housed within cylindrical concrete cores. These are punctured with porthole windows on each level that draw in light from the courtyard, which is reflected by a mirrored disk on the ceiling.

Inside, the timber and earthen brick structure of the school has been left exposed. It was left in a more raw state for the circulation areas and softened with white-painted walls and built-in timber storage in the classrooms.

This was part of a strategy by Tectoniques to allow pupils to "grasp how the building was constructed and how it functions", which also included leaving ducting, pipework and electrical conduits exposed.

"The brick brings character to the spaces whilst also contributing to optimise inertia and hygrometry. The built-in furnishings, designed and produced with poplar plywood, soften the brutalism of some equipment and service features," said the studio.

"In furtherance of this goal, the structure and utility networks remain exposed for learning purposes," it added.

Tectoniques has previously created a similarly stepped form topped by green terraces for a home in Saint-Cyr-au-Mont-d'Or, made using rough, sandy-coloured concrete that was poured in layers.

Elsewhere, Le Penhuel & Associés recently used "warm and welcoming" biomaterials to create the 2,400-square-metre Groupe Scolaire Simone Veil in the suburbs of Paris.

The photography is by Salem Mostefaoui unless stated otherwise.

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A scalloped facade of white brickwork overlooks a public square at Albion Street, a housing block in east London by local architecture studio Bell Phillips.

Located on the site of the former Albion Street Civic Centre in Rotherhithe, the 3,027-square-metre project provides 26 homes for social rent and shared ownership, alongside retail spaces and a public square.

For the housing block's design, Bell Phillips sought a "common language" between two distinctive Grade-II listed churches that bookend the site – the 1920s St Olav's Norwegian Church and the 1950s Finnish Church in London.

To the northeast, the older church informed a larger, five-storey red-brick block, which sits on a large plinth containing retail spaces to complement the existing shops on the opposite side of the street.

By contrast, the smaller southeastern block nods to the more modernist style of the Finnish Church, finished in white brickwork with a distinctive scalloped facade overlooking the public square.

"The two-storey red brick plinth responds to the horizontal banding of the traditionally-styled Norwegian Church, while white brickwork is used to tie together with the tone of the Finnish Church," explained Bell Phillips co-founder Tim Bell.

"The materials palette suits a building that seeks to achieve a strong civic presence, and enabled the creation of a distinctive scalloped façade that sits comfortably alongside its similarly characterful neighbours," Bell added.

"Both of these architectural elements are new, unexpected, and intriguing, but simultaneously harmonious with the existing architecture."

Albion Street contains a mix of one-, two- and three-bed apartments, with the building's shallow depth meaning that the majority are dual-aspect.

Living spaces have been positioned away from the north of the plan and the busy Rotherhithe Tunnel Approach, instead overlooking the street to the south from white-steel balconies atop the red-brick block's two-storey plinth.

At the southeastern end, balconies are deep-set into the scalloped white-brick facade to provide privacy from the public square below, which was upgraded with the area's popular Scandinavian markets in mind.

Where the block steps back at the fourth floor, a shared roof terrace has been created for residents.

Albion Street marks the first stage of a two-phase project by Bell Phillips for Southwark Council, which will be followed by a second block of 50 homes on the neighbouring Renforth Street.

The studio, founded by Bell alongside Hari Phillips in 2004, recently completed a housing block in Marylebone, which featured a similarly scalloped facade in pale brickwork, and added a series of mirrored pavilions to a science campus in Oxfordshire.

The photography is by Kilian O'Sullivan.

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Architect Tristan Burfield used a palette of galvanised steel and Blackbutt timber to meet bushfire regulations at No. 23, a small annexe he has added to a holiday home in Australia.

Located close to Eagle Rock on Victoria's southern coast, the annexe provides additional sleeping areas for a larger holiday home on the site, which is set among bushland, surf beaches and limestone cliffs.

Burfield used what he termed an "agricultural" palette of timber and galvanised steel for the design, leaning into the area's mandatory bushfire design requirements rather than viewing them as an obstacle.

"I rather enjoy taking seemingly boring or prescriptive building conventions or codes and trying to find the little moment to lever them just enough to be something special," Burfield told Dezeen.

"I think of it as a sort of craft of composition. The fun in this project became those subtle pairings of ultimately quite agricultural materials and detailing solutions into a composition of little architectural moments, just enough to be quietly enjoyed," he added.

No. 23 has a simple L-shaped plan organised around a paved garden, overlooked by an ensuite bedroom and bunk room through tall windows set within skinny timber frames. These are made from Blackbutt timber, a type of Australian hardwood with natural fire resistance.

Above these frames are panels of galvanised steel, which extend into a shallow canopy punctured by circular openings for rain chains that will gradually be covered by climbing plants.

Matching galvanised steel was used to frame both the openable windows and doors of the annexe, which match the tall, skinny proportions of the windows.

Inside, timber planks line the walls of No. 23, while the metalwork of the exterior is carried through into the bathrooms in a raw steel "trough" sink.

The main bedroom is organised around a freestanding log burner and alongside the bunk room is an additional bathroom.

"Lifting the bottom edge of any external window glazing away from the external floor surface is a direct requirement within that standard that is often the bane of many architects lives," Burfield explained.

"In this case, the decision to continue the window frames down to ground and substitute the lower-level glazing with timber cladding and steel at the doors respectively resulted in a lovely little moment inside and out that would otherwise not have been explored," he added.

"The steel originally came into the palette due to the owner's frustration with a previous external timber door that had sagged."

Other homes in Australia that have made a feature of the need for bushfire-resilient materials include Ironbark House by Klaus Carson Studio, which is clad in panels of corrugated steel, and Mt Coot-Tha House by Nielsen Jenkins, which has high blockwork walls.

The photography is by Tasha Tylee.

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A lantern-like sports court sits on the roof of this load-bearing stone and timber school in France, designed by local studio Le Penhuel & Associés.

Located in the Paris suburb of Tremblay-en-France, the 2,400-square-metre Groupe Scolaire Simone Veil contains eight classrooms, a canteen and administrative areas, as well as a sports court that is shared with local community groups.

Paris-based Le Penhuel & Associés used a palette of biomaterials for the school, including timber, local limestone and earth bricks, reflecting its belief that educational buildings have a responsibility to demonstrate sustainable building methods.

"We believe that a school building should clearly express its environmental commitment," associate architect Warren Lepolard told Dezeen.

"Material choices, therefore, focused on geo-sourced and bio-based materials," Lepolard continued.

"The facades are built with load-bearing stone from Bonneuil-en-Valois. Its thickness provides significant thermal inertia, while its local origin ensures durability, ease of maintenance and long-term stability of the building’s appearance."

Lepolard added that the use of biomaterials also brings warmth and a natural aesthetic to the building.

"Inside, the extensive use of timber structure creates a warm and welcoming atmosphere," he explained. "The addition of raw earth bricks between classrooms further enhances the visibility of natural and bio-based materials used throughout the building."

Respecting the smaller scale of the neighbouring residential properties, Groupe Scolaire Simone Veil is organised predominantly across a single storey. A smaller first floor contains both the sports court and an apartment for the school's guardian.

Two axes form a cross shape at the centre of the school's plan, with an elongated entrance hall from north to south and a "classroom street" connecting the teaching spaces from east to west.

This internal street is lined with colourful, arch-shaped alcoves and storage areas that overlook a row of small external patios through full-height, timber-framed windows.

Where these two routes intersect, an internal playground that doubles as a space for temporary exhibitions and events was created, demarcated by colourful blue and orange floor graphics.

"One of the project’s key gestures lies in the design of numerous 'furniture-spaces' integrated into circulation areas," Lepolard explained.

"These elements allow children to appropriate transitional spaces as playful places for learning and relaxation, transforming movement through the building into a pedagogical experience," he added.

Positioned above the canteen and administrative areas, a large stair leads up to a timber-decked terrace and Groupe Scolaire Simone Veil's rooftop sports court.

The court is framed by a large timber column and wrapped by metal mesh and polycarbonate screens. Alongside it is a steel spiral staircase leads up to an even higher roof terrace, offering expansive views out across the city.

Elsewhere in France, NTSA Architectes recently used rammed-earth walls and "age-old know-how" for its extension of a school in Villefranche-sur-Saône and Coldefy completed a timber-framed school in Cambrai with a cantilevered first floor.

The photography is by Vladimir de Mollerat du Jeu.

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Hand-fired clay tiles, exposed timber and plaster walls bring "essential simplicity" to Rosa María House, a residence near Madrid designed by Spanish architecture studio Delavegacanolasso.

Organised around two internal courtyards, the 320-square-metre home is nestled between a wooded area and a large lawn that informed Delavegacanolasso's use of a pared-back, natural material palette.

"The Rosa María House is rooted in essential simplicity – a serene, well-oriented home where light, proportion, and honest materials define the atmosphere," the studio's co-founder Ignacio de la Vega told Dezeen.

"The concept focuses on creating calm, balanced spaces that respond naturally to their environment and daily life."

A path shaded by a long white wall forms what De la Vega called a "ceremonial approach" into the home, passing beneath a porch sheltered by wooden slats to reach a central corridor.

This corridor is flanked by two patio courtyards wrapped by walls of full-height glazing and sliding doors, around which the roof geometry has been designed to control the entry of light.

"The roof is the project's defining gesture. From a simple, well-oriented plan, its geometry folds to generate two patios and a generous porch, shaping how light enters the house – when and how it should," said De la Vega.

The largest courtyard at the home's centre features a paved patio acting as an extension to the dining area, while a smaller courtyard to the north is finished with pebbles and plants.

Both the central living, dining and kitchen area of Rosa María House and the patio have been given a floor finish of hand-fired Moroccan clay tiles, intended to make the transition between inside and out feel seamless.

These floor tiles are at the centre of a deliberately simple and rustic material palette, alongside exposed plywood carpentry, pine plank ceilings, a white-painted steel framework and plastered walls.

This is mirrored in the home's exterior, which features pale cream rendered walls and pale terracotta roof tiles, typical of many of the more rural homes in the area.

"The elements in contact with the ground – floors and walls – are crafted and tactile: white plaster, pine wood, and handmade Moroccan terracotta tiles, each irregular and full of character," De la Vega explained.

"In contrast, the roof structure is light, precise, and prefabricated - designed for efficiency and clarity. This dialogue between the handcrafted and the technical reinforces the house's serene yet dynamic character," he added.

Rosa María House's bedrooms are positioned at the eastern edge of the home to take advantage of the morning sun, while facing south, the living area opens onto a sheltered terrace through sliding glass doors.

A lightweight, suspended steel staircase leads up to a study area on the home's upper level, which faces east through a window in a projecting, mono-pitched section of roof.

Delavegacanolasso was founded in 2017 by De la Vega alongside Pilar Cano-Lasso. Previous projects by the studio include a prefabricated steel-framed cabin and a mirrored extension for a hidden house in Madrid.

The photography is by Paco Marín unless stated otherwise.

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A built-in "cabinet of curiosities" housing a collection of records, books and artworks forms the spine of this outhouse extension in London by local studio Neiheiser Argyros.

Named Exeter Road Pavilion, the project involved converting the Victorian outbuilding in the garden of a north London residence into an annexe for the client, an art collector and DJ, where they could house their collection and host gatherings.

Neiheiser Argyros said it chose to approach these requirements as "a single architectural problem rather than two separate tasks".

The studio created a 20-metre-long built-in storage unit, described as a "contemporary cabinet of curiosities".

Beginning as wardrobes opposite the sleeping area, this cabinet extends to become the housing for a kitchenette and a storage space for records, artworks and books within the living area.

Once in the adjacent patio, the cabinet houses weights, a ping-pong table and garden games while also acting as a structural element, supporting a steel-framed canopy topped with sheets of corrugated polycarbonate.

"We started the project imagining the design as a kind of cabinet of curiosities, or wunderkammer, where a seemingly random collection of unrelated objects is collected and stored, allowing the visitor to curate their own connections and categories," the studio's co-founder Ryan Neiheiser told Dezeen.

"We wanted the cabinet to be both opaque, to create a quiet and unifying gesture in the space, and transparent – subtly revealing the curious objects contained within."

A long corridor alongside the cabinet connects the interior Exeter Road Pavilion, creating an open connection between the living room, study and sleeping area, which sits next to an enclosed bathroom.

The front of the cabinet has been finished in perforated steel.

This has also been used to create large doors in the garden area and smaller compartments in the living space, alongside a number of wood-lined niches for open storage and display.

For the garden canopy, one of the corner columns was removed and replaced by a block of green marble and tension rods that counterbalance the structure, representing what Neiheiser terms the "codependence" between the project's uses.

"There's a certain elegance and efficiency in the storage directly supporting the canopy, but we also wanted to introduce something a bit unexpected; a productive tension between them, holding them in relation through a sense of precarious balance," Neiheiser said.

"In this, we were inspired by the work of artists Fischli & Weiss, particularly their photographic series depicting carefully poised everyday objects, caught in the fragile instant before collapse."

"There is a provisional codependence between the different elements of the project – existing outbuilding, storage cabinet, canopy, structural column, and plinth," added Neiheiser.

Elsewhere in London, Neiheiser Argyros previously extended a Victorian terrace with a stained timber extension topped by a garden terrace.

The studio also used perforated metal to disguise London Underground vents at the faceted North Greenwich Sculptural Screen.

The photography is by Lorenzo Zandri.

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UK studio ShedKM has completed Zodiac, the transformation of a brutalist office block in Croydon, London, into temporary accommodation for families at risk of homelessness.

Located in Broad Green, the original office, Zodiac House, was built in the 1960s as part of a wider complex including the Zodiac Court tower block, which became a local icon after featuring as the home of Mark and Jez in the UK sitcom Peep Show.

When developer Common Projects acquired the office building in 2020 with a view to helping meet the Borough's need for temporary accommodation, it had stood derelict for over 25 years, but its concrete-framed structure remained intact.

Working with a steering group of locals, ShedKM set about transforming the former offices into a mix of 73 one-, two- and three-bedroom homes, accompanied by a new public green space and community pavilion.

"The building itself was the perfect opportunity for repurposing into housing; it was close to key transport links and amenities, and the building footprint, depth and structural grid lent itself well for conversion," ShedKM architectural lead Ella Flint told Dezeen.

"One of the key challenges we faced was changing the community's perception of the building without undoing or removing too much of the building's architectural and urban character," she added.

Adopting the U-shaped floor plan of the existing building, ShedKM organised the apartments on either side of a central corridor, looking either outwards towards the city or inwards towards a pair of revived courtyards.

The single-storey undercrofts that previously connected these courtyards have been turned into internal spaces, creating room for a communal residents' lounge and level access through to the newly landscaped green space at Zodiac's eastern entrance.

Aiming to retain the building's distinctive brutalist character, ShedKM kept its existing pebbledash spandrel panels and concrete fins, replacing the original single-glazed windows with double glazing and grey metal panels.

On its two entrances, the green tones of the building's distinctive zodiac plaques are referenced by a series of deep green metal panels.

This shade is carried through to the interiors, where blue-green accents have been used for communal areas, wayfinding elements and front doors, leading into the light, white-painted rooms of the apartments themselves.

"ShedKM's approach to retrofit has always been considered design moves that work with an existing building to enhance its original state – never to erode its historic identity," Flint said.

"From early stages, we knew that our approach to the building's facade would be to retain what felt sensible and introduce new materials that would enhance it."

The newly created green space, named Broad Green Common, was designed with landscape architects Planit and replaces a formerly neglected paved parking area.

At the centre of this green is a 70-square-metre community pavilion that is currently home to the Croydon Smile Hub, created by rehoming an existing cross-laminated timber structure that ShedKM originally designed as a sales booth for another of its projects.

"Broad Green long ago lost the Green in which its name is derived, and Zodiac seeks to repair that loss of public space and offer green space back to the community," Flint explained.

ShedKM is an architecture office based in London, Liverpool and Manchester. Previous projects by the studio include a church in Merseyside designed as a "physical and metaphorical beacon" for the local community.

Other recent adaptive reuse projects in the UK include John Puttick Associates' overhaul of listed warehouses in Grimsby to create a youth centre.

The photography is by Agnese Sanvito.

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The deep eaves of a large coconut-wood roof shade the bright, airy interiors of this house in Kerala, India, designed by local studio Thought Parallels Architecture as a contemporary response to the region's vernacular architecture.

Named Ananda after a Sanskrit word meaning bliss or ultimate happiness, the dwelling was designed for a couple based in the USA who desired a residence close to their ancestral home.

Tasked by the clients with evoking Kerala's vernacular architecture in a contemporary way, Thought Parallels Architecture used a palette of red brickwork, mangalore clay tiles, teak wood and carved fretwork panels, united under an oversized coconut wood roof.

"The core concept was to design the house in sync with the local architecture prevalent to the region, but with a vocabulary and syntax which speaks of our times, reinventing the old into a contemporary voice," partners Nikhil Mohan and Shabna Nikhil told Dezeen.

"An unstoppably Indian, natural, local, crafty, artsy, sustainable, cerebral, minimal, contemporary response to vernacular," they added.

A paved entrance route through a front garden leads into Ananda's defining space – a double-height living, dining and kitchen area organised around a concrete spiral staircase that draws the gaze upwards to the exposed, diagonal roof beams above.

"Looking up from the stairway, you can see intricate diagonal-shaped coconut wood roofing. This design evokes a dynamic effect and adds a distinct aesthetic to the space. a modern response to the vernacular of the place," Mohan and Nikhil said.

"Coconut wood, while traditionally used in Kerala unceremoniously and without precision, lost its popularity in favour of teak. Here, it is utilised as a sustainable and cost-effective alternative," they added.

The northern wall of this double-height space is fully glazed, with sliding doors at the ground floor opening out onto a garden terrace.

On the first floor level, this glazed wall frames the tree canopies from a balcony in the upper living area and an adjacent study, which also overlooks the living space through a small shuttered window.

Opposite this glazed wall, the home's air conditioning units are concealed by carved wooden wall panels inspired by carvings in the 16th-century Padmanabhapuram Palace.

Teak has been used to frame Ananda's windows and doors, alongside lime-plastered walls and stone-tiled floors, matching the patio paving on the ground floor to create a sense of continuity between interior and exterior.

Two ensuite bedrooms are stacked at the southern side of the home, with the ground-floor bedroom opening onto a garden patio.

These bedrooms are sheltered from the southern sun by a screen of narrow timber slats on Ananda's facade, behind which are windows that slide open to offer natural ventilation.

On Ananda's front elevation, the angular brick walls of the bedroom block have been finished in red brickwork, with a distinctive pattern created at the corners by leaving gaps where courses meet.

At the bottom of the home's spiral staircase is a basement level sunk into the lower, southern side of the site, which contains a garage and storage areas.

Other homes in India recently featured on Dezeen include the minimalist, concrete Zenhouse in Kerala by Studio Nirvana and the airy, open House by The Grove in Bengaluru by Taliesyn.

The photography is by Syam Sreesylam.

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Sand-coloured walls, hieroglyph motifs and a trapezoidal rooftop extension celebrate the Egyptian revival style of this Grade II-listed boiler house in Kent, transformed into an office by local studio Felix Lewis Architects.

Now named The Works, the former boiler house overlooks the River Medway in East Farleigh. It was built in 1860 by architect James Pilbrow and represents a rare example of Egyptian revival architecture in Britain.

Felix Lewis Architects converted the structure into a headquarters for hi-fi company Chord Electronics, retaining its original character while overhauling its interiors with sand-toned walls and glazed partitions emblazoned with hieroglyphs.

On the roof of The Works, a training space is housed in an extension that continues the brick boiler house's trapezoidal form, clad in rusty Corten steel in reference to the site's former industrial purpose.

"A key ambition was for the extension to remain subservient to the original listed structure, responding to both planning and heritage requirements," studio director Felix Lewis told Dezeen.

"Egyptian Revival architecture was historically used to express ideas of timelessness and eternity – often in memorials and tombs – and the intention here was to create something similarly timeless, with a slightly anachronistic quality," he added.

"Rough industrial materials were used to reference the site’s industrial past, with the rusted tones of the Corten steel helping the building sit comfortably within the greens and browns of its semi-rural setting."

The spaces of The Works have been distributed across three floors. A meeting room and the CEO's office sit on the ground floor, featuring large windows overlooking the riverfront that can be accessed via two external black steel staircases.

In order to make the ground floor more flood resilient, it has been tanked and lined internally with a datum of terrazzo tiling, with the building's services also raised above potential flood levels.

A timber-and-steel stair housed within a glazed volume leads up to further workspaces on the first floor. On both this level and the ground floor, bathrooms have been housed within the chunky volume of the boiler house's former chimney.

On the top floor, the extension houses a large training space, which opens out onto a balcony created by stepping the extension back from the perimeter of the existing building's roof.

While the balcony-facing side is fully glazed, the long sides of this extension were left blank to create what Lewis described as a "sense of monumentality", with a single central window referencing the central opening in an Egyptian pylon or gateway.

Other conversions of former industrial workspaces into offices include 469 Bethnal Green Road in London by Carmody Groarke, which saw a former textile workshop expanded with a rooftop extension clad in galvanised steel, and Greencoat Place, which Squire and Partners created within a 19th-century warehouse with ornate cast-iron columns.

The photography is by Chris Snook. 

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UK studio John Puttick Associates has refurbished a group of disused Victorian warehouses in Grimsby to create the Horizon Youth Zone, adding a sawtooth-roofed sports court that nods to the site's industrial past.

Forming part of the wider regeneration of Grimsby's town centre, the Horizon Youth Zone provides 2,995 square metres of arts, performance and sports space for young people in the area.

The disused Grade II-listed structures overlooking the River Freshney date back to 1821. Originally designed as granary warehouses, they were converted into a maltings and later a sawmill, before closing in the 1990s.

Building on what John Puttick Associates called the "strong civic presence" of these warehouses, their brick-and-timber frames have been carefully restored and expanded with a zinc-clad sports hall topped by an industrial-style sawtooth roof.

"The Victorian warehouses directly face the River Freshney and form an important piece of Grimsby's townscape," founder John Puttick told Dezeen.

"The project involves a complex mix of restoration and rebuilding to reimagine the industrial heritage as an exciting destination for young people," he added.

A refurbished footbridge across the river strengthens the site's connection to the city and leads directly into the largest warehouse building, which has been opened up to create a dramatic, triple-height entrance framed by black steelwork.

From this orienting space, an L-shaped plan sees the sports court to the north and a mixture of more compartmentalised performance, art and craft, meeting and mentoring spaces to the west.

Two smaller floors above the reception area include offices, a recording studio and a music room, accessed via corridors that overlook the triple-height atrium through fully glazed walls.

The poor condition of large parts of the site required John Puttick Associates to reconstruct the site's southern river wall and replace several roofs with glued-laminated timber (glulam) trusses, left visible overhead in the interiors.

Wherever possible, existing masonry was reused, while in areas that required new construction, a matching shade of brick was used.

This brickwork is complemented by the zinc-clad sports court, as well as a smaller climbing wall housed within a mesh-wrapped cube.

Inside the communal and sports spaces, areas of brickwork have been left exposed, while in the centre's other spaces white walls are paired with a bright palette of blues, greens and purples.

"We wanted the new additions to be contemporary, announcing the new activities of the site, but also responsive to the industrial heritage," Puttick said.

"New-build elements – the sports hall and performance space – are contemporary in character but chime with the industrial context, creating a rich mix of forms and materials."

Externally, the L-shaped form of the warehouses hugs an outdoor recreational space and sports pitch, overlooked by large windows in the performance space and kitchen.

John Puttick Associates is a London-based architectural studio founded in 2014. Previous projects by the studio include the extension of a Grade II-listed church in East Sussex and the refurbishment of the brutalist Preston Bus Station.

The photography is by Gareth Gardner.

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Local studios Johan Sundberg Arkitektur and Tengbom used an exposed structure of pine and spruce to create a "sensory experience" at Kursgården Kämpasten, a campus of the Stockholm School of Economics in Sweden.

Set within a secluded and forested slope close to Lake Mälaren on the outskirts of Sigtuna, the campus hosts the Stockholm School of Economics (SSE)'s executive education programmes.

Lund-based Johan Sundberg Architektur and Stockholm-based Tengbom were tasked with designing a new heart for the campus, following Kämpasten's former catering building being destroyed by a fire in 2018.

Looking to foster a closer connection with the picturesque site and surrounding woodland, the studios created a building with bright, open interiors, framed by an exposed timber and concrete structure and wrapped by full-height glazing.

"Our core concept was not merely to replace the lost function, but to reinforce the sensory experience of Kämpasten," Johan Sundberg Arkitekter founder Johan Sundberg told Dezeen.

"We aimed to create specific atmospheres - through spatial sequencing, materiality, and light - that help course participants feel a deeper connection to the place," he continued.

"The collaboration with Tengbom was structured to avoid the common pitfall where a project is handed off like a baton between a 'design architect' and a 'production architect.' Instead, we operated with 'shared custody' of the building."

Partially sunk into the sloping site atop an exposed concrete base, the building is spread across two storeys. Below are the conference, meeting, office and technical areas, while above the dining areas have been positioned to benefit from expansive views.

To the north, half of the building has been angled away from the rectilinear form of the dining areas, orienting its entrance towards a new communal square that has been created on the site of the former dining hall.

The triangular space created at the centre of the plan by this "angular shift" was used to house the bar and buffet areas as well as a concrete stairwell, beneath a central strip of skylights.

Kämpasten's interior finishes reflect the split between openness and enclosure across the building's two levels, with the timber frame left exposed on the upper level and infilled with timber panels below.

"This displacement of the main axes allows the roof ridge to 'crack' open, forming a lantern that sends daylight down into the deep centre of the building," said Sundberg. A central staircase distributes this light to the lower level."

"The spatial experience offers a clear duality: the upper level is an open construction with outward views toward the forest and lake, while the bottom floor provides the opposite – enclosure, smooth wood ceilings, and intimate ground contact," he added.

Sundberg founded his eponymous studio in 2006, while Tengbom is one of Sweden's oldest architectural practices, founded in 1906 by Ivar Tengbom and Ernst Torulf.

Recent projects by the studios include a stilted holiday home clad in Siberian larch by Johan Sundberg Arkitektur, and Tengbom's design for its own studio building in Stockholm, inserting a demountable fit-out into a renovated 1930s factory.

The photography is courtesy of Erik Lefvander.

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Soaring wooden ceilings frame the interiors of Vaulting Loft, a flat in Hampstead, London, renovated and extended by local studio Mata Architects.

The flat occupies the top floor of a detached Victorian property in a conservation area of Hampstead in north London, which required that any interventions were invisible from the street.

Using the "valley" created between the roofs of the two neighbouring properties to its advantage, Mata Architects worked with engineers Float Structures to create an entirely new roof that would transform the flat's interior while maintaining a discreet profile externally.

Reaching a maximum height of 4.8 metres, the revamped roof created space for a third bedroom and a mezzanine level, with a form that rises and falls to create a changing atmosphere throughout the interior.

"We saw that by infilling the valley between two parallel roof ridges, we could add substantial space and volume," studio founder Dan Marks told Dezeen.

"The new roof sits entirely within the building's existing footprint when viewed from ground level, respecting the conservation area while transforming the interior experience completely," he continued.

"We envisioned the apartment as a white, cathedral-like space defined by the ever-present dynamic roof form – at times soaring to nearly five metres, at others dropping to waist height to create more intimate, human-scale moments."

The interior of Vaulting Loft has been organised around an oak block at its centre, which contains storage and a bathroom while supporting the skylit mezzanine level above.

This block also separates the plan's three bedrooms from the living, dining and kitchen area, where a set of sliding glass doors framed by an arch-like pitch in the ceiling lead out onto a balcony.

White finishes were used throughout the interiors of Vaulting Loft to emphasise the geometry of the roof, with both the ceiling beams and Douglas fir floorboards treated with white oil.

This is contrasted by the exposed oak of the central block, as well as darker timber used in the bedroom areas and Taj Mahal Quartzite stone used for the kitchen counters and splashbacks.

"We wanted a restrained palette that would let the architecture speak. The white-painted surfaces throughout emphasise the roof structure and the volume it creates," Marks said.

"We treated the exposed roof beams with a strong white oil," he added. "Ii their natural stat,e they felt too chalet-like, but the oil preserves the timber's texture while keeping the space light and unified."

Marks founded Mata Architects in 2015, having previously been director of the eponymous Dan Marks Studio. Previous projects include the expansion of his own self-designed home in London and a timber-clad extension with windows concealed behind large shutters.

The photography is by Felix Speller.

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Pale brick, clay-fired tiles and ash carpentry were used to bring tactility and warmth to this Victorian terrace house in London, extended by local architecture studio TYPE.

Located in Denmark Hill, the home was expanded for a young family, with a larger kitchen and dining area introduced on the ground floor and an extra bedroom and home office in the attic.

TYPE focused on creating a "sensory richness" for the interiors, with a tactile and natural palette based on the existing materiality of the 19th-century terrace.

"There is intentionally not one dominant element, the project was conceived as a series of modest but meaningful and holistic interventions which together transform daily life," the studio told Dezeen.

"One of the main themes was to create humanistic spaces which have a sensory richness, so the touch, acoustic properties, light, and smell were all important characteristics," it added.

"While being a contemporary space, the material selection relates to the existing construction, which is primarily clay and timber, both of which feature prominently in the extension and refurbishment."

At the back of Denmark Hill, a formerly narrow and dark galley kitchen has been expanded to make space for a dining area, illuminated by a long timber-framed skylight.

A full-height pivot glass door opens this space out onto the garden, with the internal paved flooring extending out to a patio.

Alongside the pivot door is a frameless corner window that projects out into the garden. It features a built-in bench made from ash, matching the carpentry of the kitchen cabinets and island.

For the exterior of the ground-floor extension, two subtly different tones of hand-moulded masonry were used, with a lower datum finished in white brickwork and the upper section in pale cream.

"Tactility, craftsmanship, and a feeling of warmth further inspired the choices of materials and construction," the studio explained.

"It was important to use robust, timeless, and natural materials which would be suitable for the heavy wear and tear of family life," it added.

In the new attic spaces, the walls have also been lined with ash panelling and built-in storage, and the floors finished in cork for acoustic comfort.

Despite its relatively small size, a series of skylights and windows were introduced to provide views of the sky and city through the sloping white-painted ceilings.

"The bedroom includes a large vertical panoramic window which frames views of the city and sky, and rooflight above the shower floods the bathroom with light while giving a feeling of being outside, underneath the sky," said the studio.

TYPE was founded in 2013 by directors Sam Nelson, Tom Powell, Ogi Ristic, and Matt Cooper.

Its previous projects include an extension to a home in Herne Hill and the overhaul of a flat on the Golden Lane Estate.

The photography is by Lorenzo Zandri.

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A dark palette of concrete, metal and stone references the craggy surface of a lava field surrounding Swan Nest, a summerhouse by local studio Yrki Arkitektar overlooking one of Iceland's most active volcanoes.

Located on a rolling green site with dramatic views of the stratovolcano Hekla, the two-storey dwelling was designed for the family of Yrki Arkitektar's founder, Ásdís Helga Ágústsdóttir.

Designed to feel embedded in the landscape, Swan Nest has been partially sunk into its site, with a cubic timber-clad form sandwiched between two large retaining walls of exposed concrete.

"The project is deeply shaped by its site – a semi-remote retreat near a river, surrounded by vast, unspoiled nature formed by volcanic forces and softened by sloping hills and scattered trees," Ágústsdóttir told Dezeen.

"The design is intentionally understated and recessive, letting the terrain lead, the views unfold, and the spaces balance shelter with openness, permanence with softness," Ágústsdóttir added.

Swan Nest's main bedroom, bathroom and sauna are on the lower level, with their sunken position intended to create the feeling of a more enclosed "sanctuary".

Above, the living, dining and kitchen spaces sit alongside an additional bedroom on the ground floor, wrapped by a continuous timber deck that can be accessed from each room via large sliding glass doors.

Illuminating the living space is a volcano-shaped skylight lined in concrete that projects from the home's roof, while in the kitchen, a porthole window frames a view of Hekla in the distance.

Throughout the interior of Swan Nest, darker tones provide a contrast to the surrounding grassland and snow-capped volcano, with dark steel, concrete and marble alluding to the craggy surface and geological processes of lava fields.

This palette of greys also extends to the furniture and soft furnishings, including areas of black-stained timber storage.

"Materiality was fundamental to the project, shaping both the structure and the atmosphere of the house," explained Ágústsdóttir.

"Concrete is the primary building material – robust, enduring, and honest. Interior walls are left in raw concrete, carrying the subtle marks of their making and catching the shifting northern light throughout the day."

"In the kitchen, black and white stone surfaces pair with black-stained wood cabinetry, echoing the contrasts of the surrounding environment - lava fields, snow, and shadow," Ágústsdóttir added.

The roof of Swan Nest has been finished with a grass roof to help it blend with the surrounding landscape, while the exterior cladding of thermally-treated timber planks will gradually silver over time.

Based in Rejkjavik, Yrki Arkitektar was founded by Ágústsdóttir alongside Sólveig Berg in 1997.

Other homes recently completed in Iceland include an "elemental" black metal-clad cabin by Studio Bua, which overlooks the expansive Breidafjordur fjord, and a gridded home with a wall of rammed earth renovated by ARG Architects.

The photography is by Nanne Springer.

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Dutch studio i29 and construction company Jatin Chaletbouw have completed Lounge Lodge, a compact holiday home in the Netherlands, revealed here in this Dezeen Exclusive.

Located in the RCN Noordster holiday park in Dwingeloo, the 20-square-metre holiday lodge sits surrounded by trees, into which its pale green-painted timber exterior is designed to blend.

Lounge Lodge was created by Jatin Chaletbouw and i29 partner Chris Collaris to show how a distinctive retreat could be made without "crazy budgets".

"We are used to designer villas with crazy budgets, but what if it comes down to the essence of a retreat?" Collaris told Dezeen.

"Is it possible to make a distinctive concept for a modest retreat, guided by the idea of smart affordability and the power of simplicity?" Collaris added.

Lounge Lodge comprises a small cabin and a sheltered external terrace, raised on a low timber platform accessed via a wooden staircase.

Inside, the lodge is divided into two halves.

One contains a living, dining and kitchen space overlooking the forest through sliding glass doors, while the other holds a bedroom and bathroom.

A small staircase leads up to a mezzanine level with further sleeping space, bringing the cabin's maximum occupancy to four people.

Built-in cabinets, a folding dining table and sliding doors help to keep the space streamlined and introduce flexibility.

"The retreat functions as a Swiss army knife. It is very little and compact, but there is everything you need," Collaris said.

"Social spaces like the kitchen and living are small and blend together, but feel bigger because of the direct connection with the outside," he continued. "You can still experience two partly separated sleeping areas and a bathroom, but these places also work together as a lofty space when needed."

Lounge Lodge's interior is lined in poplar plywood, which has been stained green for the kitchen and lower sleeping areas to match the pale green spruce exterior.

The ceiling and walls of the mezzanine level have been finished in white to help create a feeling of spaciousness, aided by a small, high-level window overlooking the forest.

On the exterior, vertical battens were introduced to add "deepness and character" to the facades, Collaris said, and to create changing shadows across them throughout the day.

Before becoming a partner at i29, Collaris' own firm, Chris Collaris Architects, frequently collaborated with the studio, with projects including the black timber-clad Tiny Holiday Home near Amsterdam.

Other recent projects in the Netherlands by i29 include the black-timber Senior Shelter, designed for an elderly couple, and Buitenverblijf Nest, a "folly high up in the trees" that references birdhouses and nests.

The photography is by Ewout Huibers.

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