An existing three-family house from the 50s, situated in a, for this decade, typical featureless residential area, should be fundamentally renovated and modernised for the use by a married couple. While the exterior form of the existing building wasn’t allowed to change, the interior was completely converted. New airspaces and galleries, which connect the different levels, create the favoured open living-structure. Existing windows were closed almost completely and replaced by new openings in roof and walls, with different sizes, forms and functions.
Both ceiling-high windows on the ground-floor can be wide opened, so that the living- and dining-area inside is getting a unity area with the front- and backyard. A large-sized skylight above the three-storey airspace, with a planted tree in it, provides an ideal natural lighting of the house.
At the outside the stainless steel covering, coherent on walls and roof, reflects the environment and wants the house to dematerialise, in order to adapt to the existing surrounding without being subordinated to it.
Photography is by Valentin Wormbs
Info and images © Bernd Zimmermann
