Text description provided by the architects. This project refers to the renovation of an existing apartment and the custom design of all the new furniture in order to meet the specific needs of the owners. Due to practical and financial limitations it was not possible to remove, remodel or reconstruct any interior walls of the existing apartment. Therefore, the design proposal focuses on the use of furniture as actual building components that aim at transforming both the formal and the functional character of the space.
The living area provided ground for spatial experimentation: Instead of selecting various furniture pieces for the different functional needs, a unified spatial construction was designed to respond to diverse needs in a uniform way. This construction has the form of a new wooden floor positioned 40 cm above the existing marble floor of the apartment. Through the creation of a series of recesses and extrusions, this new level allows different functions to take place above it (sitting, circulation, library), while at the same time is capable of covering secondary functional elements underneath it (lighting, speakers, video projector, storage). The basic goal of the design was to create a living floor that could be used in diverse and unpredictable ways.
The dining area is positioned next to the living area. In response to the uniform wooden floor, the dining chairs are interlocking with the dining table in order to form a single wooden box.
The design of the bedroom evolved from two separate programmatic needs: The owners wanted to install extra closets and they also wanted a four poster bed. The result is a wooden plane that spans the width of the room and functions as both the tester of the bed and the enclosure of a closet.
