A country retreat. That was the dream of the young couple with children, when back in 2019 they hired us to design their country house interiors. Long-time clients of our firm, they expressed their desire for a cosy space, which could offer the same amenities they have in their home in the city, but providing other sensory and aesthetic experiences, with a more direct interaction with nature.
Due to the pandemic, this desire was strengthened and translated into the search for lightness and calmness in each one of the rooms. A neutral palette has then been adopted, dictating the décor of the entire residence. Avoiding any colourful element – in order not to compromise the peaceful aura that we intended to emphasize –, the design approach focused on exploring different forms, framings and plasticities, especially promoting the use of natural materials.
Above the city level, located on top of one of the central neighborhood’s hills, a sloping terrain gives way to the Asa de Borboleta Residence. Adopting the lifestyle and preferences of the family, the project approached the contemporary applied to the location and the direction of the land to the city related to the path of the sun.
At first glance, when entering the gate, a patio in front of the children’s bedrooms introduces the lightness and the relationship of the house with the outside. The brise element on the bedroom doors allows light and ventilation to enter, whether open or closed.
Two residential towers designed by MVRDV for developer Provast have been completed in The Hague. The Grotius Towers, which are 120 and 100 metres tall, are located on Grotiusplaats, a stone’s throw from the city’s Central Station and alongside the Royal Library of the Netherlands. With their striking crowns of stacked apartments, the towers add affordable rental housing at the very centre of the city, with a public transport hub on the doorstep. Of the 655 apartments in the complex, 114 are intended for social rent, with a further 295 targeted at the mid-market rental sector.
As the fourth most populated city in Indonesia, residential land in the metropolitan area of Bandung city remains limited. Paperhome is a compact house located in the touristic Dago suburb, known for a decent and relatively cold tropic weather, with scenic viewing at the uphill part of Bandung. Located in the crowded area of Dago, Paperhome sits at 6 x 10-meter lot facing northern side. Given a nearby public school and the main street within 20-meter radius, the noise provokes as one of the design challenge.
Located a few steps from one of the most emblematic avenues of the city of Mérida, Casa Maca is a historic former residence from the Porfiriato era. Visitors are transported to the past, where they are easily captivated by the vitality of the structure’s colors and textures.
After removing any damaged finishings during restoration, the excellent quality of workmanship with which the original walls were built is easy to appreciate. The original, freshly exposed stone masonry was preserved and framed by lightly colored moldings, as though they are their own works of art.
Concrete has created a unique residential project in New York City, a 222-residence condominium in the mystique Hell’s Kitchen: 547 West 47th street, The West Residence Club.
Concrete presents its first residential project on Manhattan. 547 West 47th street, The West Residence is a unique residential building; with loft-type apartments designed in an up-cycled brick base, and penthouse-like apartments located in the cloud, the open and bright top of the building exploiting views over the Hudson river and the cosmopolite New York skyline.
Housing 222 of apartments, The West Residence Club opened its doors in the spring of 2022. Concrete is responsible for the architecture, interior and landscape design of the project.
Designed by T.K. Chu Design, the four-story villa named Greencore is located among hills, woods, and lakes. With angled cornices and floor-to-ceiling windows, it shows an integration of traditional Chinese garden and modern building, which combines people, nature, and architecture perfectly, and gives off a vague animist aura. As a top-tier real estate project in Taizhou, Zhejiang province, the Villa Greencore pays tribute to the city spirit, namely ‘和合’. The word can be translated in English in various ways: inclusive, harmonious, confluent, etc. According to the architectural characters and urban context, T.K. Chu’s vision of the villa is a place where art encounters space and humanity meets nature.
Designed in collaboration with the client – an architect based in Truckee – Analog House celebrates a rugged, high desert site populated by ponderosa pine, manzanita and exposed basalt. The home’s footprint meanders through the understory, deliberately shaped to preserve existing specimen trees and create a protected internal courtyard. Extensive transparency and clerestory windows throughout the home provide access to views and daylight, while numerous indoor/outdoor connections link occupants to their surroundings, an important consider for this active family.
Bellgave, a private residence in Los Angeles, is situated above Laurel Canyon Boulevard on a cul-de-sac in the Hollywood Hills. With its elevated position at the edge of a steep promontory, the site offers unobstructed panoramic views from downtown Los Angeles to Santa Monica. Its north-south orientation aligns with the grid of the city basin below, and the tone for its architectural context is set by mid-century landmarks such as Pierre Koenig’s landmark Stahl House (Case Study House No. 22), which can be glimpsed on a nearby promontory to the west.
Located on the end of a quiet, residential street in Chennai, overlooking the ocean – the project site called out for a house that opened and offered itself to the surroundings but also swaddled in its layers of privacy and barriers shielding itself from the open environment it is placed in. The design brief was very simple hence making it much more challenging – a gift from a father for his daughter who was getting married and the house would be the starting point of her new journey. The 39’x93’ linear plot had its larger side facing the ocean front with a beautiful view of the Bay of Bengal. Like every beach front property, a default requirement was to ensure that every part of the house had a view of the ocean.