Dwell - January/February 2022

Home Tech Grows Up New Products for Parents (And a Case for Unplugging) Budget Breakdown The Reality Behind An Atlanta Renovation At Home in the Modern World

Meet Me in the Middle Fixing a Hole in the Housing Market

dwell.com January / February 2022

January/February 2022 “I think there’s a big move right now to meet the need for missing middle-market housing.”

D’Arcy Jones, architect Page 80

CONTENTS

8O dwellings

60 A Promising Outlook

COVER

Michael Imperial and Aiko Lista hold their son, Nathan, outside their British Columbia home.

PHOTO BY Grant Harder ABOVE

A brutalist-inspired condo project in Canada proves high design isn’t always out of reach.

PHOTO BY Grant Harder

A Los Angeles couple take a risk on renovating and reap the rewards.

TEXT

Janelle Zara PHOTOS

Ye Rin Mok

70 Off the Wall

80 Happily Medium

Just outside Paris, a dancer finds the perfect perch for her family among the trees.

A development in Victoria, British Columbia, finds a new slant on the everelusive, middle-market housing model.

TEXT

Patricia Gajo

TEXT

PHOTOS

Stacey McLachlan

Jérémie Léon

PHOTOS

Grant Harder

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January/February 2022 90

50 CONTENTS

56

departments 11 Editor’s Letter 13 Community

18 Dwell Design Awards

38 Conversation

56 Small Spaces

Our expert judges weigh in on the best projects and products of 2021.

When and how to introduce kids to contemporary technology is an increasingly fraught topic. Journalist and mother Sophie Brickman advocates for a measured approach.

A tight footprint doesn’t constrain the creativity of a multifunctional art studio.

27 Modern World

106 Sourcing See it? Want it? Need it? Buy it!

108 One Last Thing Historian Michelle Millar Fisher highlights a device that represents a turning point in designing for parenthood.

Navigating the ever-changing world of technology made for growing families can be daunting, even for the savviest consumer.

We talked to the experts and found the best of what’s out there now and how to decide what’s right for you.

EDITED BY

Margaret Rhodes Jamie Chung

PHOTOS BY

TEXT BY

44 Prefab A modest, locally made retreat leaves a light footprint on the Latvian countryside.

TEXT BY

Vejay Nair Reinis Hofmanis

PHOTOS BY

50 Interiors Walls would only cramp the style of this Brooklyn loft, which takes a creative approach to dividing up space.

TEXT BY

Get a full year of Dwell at dwell.com/subscribe

Youngna Park Daniel Gray-Barnett

ILLUSTRATIONS BY

TEXT BY

Laura Mauk João Carranca

PHOTOS BY

90 Budget Breakdown An Atlanta designer rolls up her sleeves and takes tools in hand to renovate a home without breaking the bank.

TEXT BY

Muriel Vega Benjamin Rasmussen

PHOTOS BY

94 Outside It’s all wood grain and mountain vibes in this Montana fly-fishing lodge, built for two longtime friends to share.

TEXT BY

Joe Eaton Rebecca Stumpf

PHOTOS BY

Nikhita Mahtani Matt Dutile

PHOTOS BY

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Residence by hunterOFFICE Architecture Inc. Photography by Provoke Studios.

WE BELIEVE IN EXCEEDING PERFORMANCE STANDARDS And so do our design partners.

Innotech Windows + Doors is a North American manufacturer of high-performance European-style tilt and turn windows and exterior doors. Our products are specified by progressive design professionals for custom residences that are both architecturally striking and deeply sustainable.

Learn more about our Passive House Institute certified windows and doors: www.innotech-windows.com/passive-house

Available at:

406-414-0778

innotech@cpsupply.us cpsupply.us/innotech

editor’s letter

The Middle Ground

Brutal bidding wars. Ten rejected offers. Undercuts from cash buyers. Twenty rejected offers. We’ve all heard stories, or have our own, about house-hunting headaches—or maybe searing migraines. To call the market “overheated” understates how hard it is to buy a home in many places right now. Single-family properties are regularly selling for way above asking price, but the only available alternatives are often apartments with far smaller square footage. For many people who are doing relatively well—middle class by any measure—there seem to be fewer areas where they can afford to have children or just get a bit more space. They are staring into the “missing middle” of the housing market.

But some designers, builders, and organizations have come up with creative ways to construct medium-density multifamily developments close to city centers, with homes that they can sell at approachable price points and still make the numbers work. Pearl Block, a group of attached townhouses named for its street in Victoria, British Columbia, offers a playbook (p. 80). The project was conceived when developer Ryan Goodman found an unloved lot that had languished unsold because its odd dimensions weren’t ideal for the kinds of single-family homes traditionally built in its desirable, close-todowntown neighborhood. Then architect D’Arcy Jones determined how to fit six comfortably scaled units on the site. They ultimately listed starting at USD $650,000—which might seem like a lot, but it’s still 25 percent less than the current median in Victoria.

And with its striking, neobrutalist facade, Pearl Block doesn’t compromise on aesthetics, either.

On Dwell.com, look for features about others following similar strategies: a studio designing moderately priced homes for Chicago’s narrow unused lots, a Seattle designer turned developer building an infill project on a steep site, and an organization in Massachusetts partnering with homeowners to develop their existing single-family lots into higher-density co-ops. By seeing opportunities in overlooked spaces—and using creative design to build there—they all are sizing up the missing middle and discovering an open field for innovation.

PHOTO: BRIAN W. FERRY

William Hanley, Editor-in-Chief william@dwell.com

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Dwell Editorial Editor-in-Chief William Hanley Managing Editor Jack Balderrama Morley

Dwell 548 Market Street PMB 95259 San Francisco, CA 94104-5401

Executive Editor Jenny Xie Senior Editor Mike Chino

Dwell®, the Dwell logo, Dwell Media, and At Home in the Modern World are registered trademarks of Dwell Life, Inc.

letters@dwell.com

Editor, Dwell Creative Services Robyn Wise Articles Editor Sarah Buder Associate Editor Samantha Daly Assistant Editor Duncan Nielsen Contributing Editor Kelly Vencill Sanchez Copy Chief Suzy Parker Fact Checkers Meredith Clark Brendan Cummings Jy Murphy Dora Vanette Creative Director Suzanne LaGasa Photo Director Susan Getzendanner Art Director Derek Eng

CEO Zach Klein

Dwell.com

Advertising

CRO Nicole Wolfgram

Director, Product Management Daniel Miesner

Director of Sales Tara Smith tara@dwell.com

Founder / Chair Lara Hedberg Deam

Engineering Manager Jim Redd

Board Member Dave Morin

Senior Product Designer Brandon Dorn

Branded Content Manager Haley Heramb haley@dwell.com

Adviser Jennifer Moores

Software Engineers Sherif Elmetwally Camille Jackson Wing Lian

Marketing Article Reprints Send requests to: reprints@dwell.com Subscription Inquiries Call toll-free: 877-999-9559 Outside the U.S. and Canada: 515-248-7689 subhelp@dwell.com

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Director of Marketing Ellin Youse

Account Services Manager Doree Antig doree@dwell.com Assistant Account Manager David Marin david@dwell.com Sales Production Manager Maris Newbury maris@dwell.com

Senior Marketing Manager Erin V. Mahoney Digital Marketing Associate Ian Zunt

JAN UARY/FEB RUARY 2022

DWELL MEDIA

contributors

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COMMUNITY

PHOTOS: MARLIN OLYNYK (1); COURTESY VEJAY NAIR (2); COURTESY YOUNGNA PARK (3)

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1. Grant Harder, photographer, “Happily Medium,” p. 80 If Grant’s not on a shoot, he’s likely camping somewhere near his Vancouver home with his wife and two kids, sleeping in the pop top of their VW (when the crotchety van isn’t in the shop, that is).

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JAN UARY/FEB RUARY 2022

2. Vejay Nair, writer, “Only the Essentials,” p. 44 Vejay reports from his home in snowy Helsinki: “Winter in the Nordics can be challenging. While days are short, the promise of a bright, crisp morning in early February is always something to look forward to, even if we’re still waking up in the dark.”

3. Youngna Park, writer, “Sophie Brickman,” p. 38 A product adviser focused on family tech, Youngna lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her partner and their two daughters. She read Brickman’s 2021 book, Baby, Unplugged, while watching her six-year-old master the monkey bars and trying to keep her four-year-old off her iPhone.

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comments

“This is friggin’ delightful. They’ve used all they’ve got, in terms of light and space, indoor and out, and gotten so many generous spaces out of it. Good for them.”

—Caroline Kelly via Dwell.com

Comments [Re: “Livable America,” November/ December 2021] I am very curious to see what cities fit the majority of these livability criteria and still have a mix of affordable housing.

With the Covid real estate boom, it doesn’t seem like you can have safe, affordable, and walkable all in one neighborhood.

CHARLOTTE BRAVO CANNON, VIA DWELL.COM

Re: Black Siding [Re: “Amy Stelly,” November/ December 2021] Thank you for this insightful and revealing article. Very important stuff here.

@LIZIVESHENDERSON

CAROLYN A., VIA DWELL.COM EDITORS’ NOTE: An

artwork on the wall of the house featured in “Shifting Gears” on page 54 of the September/October 2021 issue is a copy, made by the home’s owner, of a design by Lilian Martinez of BFGF.

Instagram This rentable cabin in northern Wisconsin was a hit with our followers.

Designed by David Wagner of Sala Architects for father and son Jeff and Bruce McPheeters, the structure features Cor-Ten steel on one side and, on the other, a wall of windows overlooking the idyllic countryside.

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I live in Montana, and it looks beautiful in the snow.

A great color for cold climates. People doing it in Austin makes zero sense.

@ATELIERJORGENSON

It’s depressing.

As Morticia Addams puts it, “Color is for people with no imagination.”

@TAGSHULL

@HEYMIAANDERSON

Love

Hate

@MICANDERSO

It was great until everyone started doing it.

Contrast is everything.

@DJMPOLIS

Foliage pops against it, and the darkness allows the shape of the structure to stand out. @DAVIESDELDIABLO

If we’re talking the classic Japanese technique, it looks great and has so much history behind it. @MANOFACTION

The world is warming, but just crank up the air-conditioning in your black Death Star. @JESSGUATNEYSTUDIO

JAN UARY/FEB RUARY 2022

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PHOTOS: MOHAMED SADEK (“LAYERS OF INTEREST”); COREY GAFFER (INSTAGRAM). ILLUSTRATION: PETER OUMANSKI

COMMUNITY

Aria Jahanshahi of Opa Architecture and designer Gjergji Shkurti helped Anna Clark and Thanhyen Nguyen turn their Brooklyn townhouse into a layered, multifunctional home [“Layers of Interest,” November/December 2021] where a curtain can block off the primary bedroom, motorcycles fit beneath a music studio, and a closet doubles as a meditation nook.

E X P E R I E N C E

V I S U A L

C O M F O R T

LIGHTWELL GRANDE TRIPLE CHANDELIER IN SOFT BRASS DESIGNER: BARBARA BARRY

SHOP NOW: CIRCALIGHTING.COM 877.762.2323

dwell asks

What would your ideal home robot do?

COMMUNITY

They work in hospitals, factories, and space stations, but where are they when we need them most? Readers share what their dream household robots would accomplish.

Take my dog for a walk. @kristine.rungis

Help me clean the house, talk with me, and ask me to paint cats on the wall. @meh_devos Cook and clean. @jejelita Manage conflicts between the kids. @ren_chalk Put away dishes, groceries, and laundry. @ejdevangelista

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Keep the countertops sparkling clean all the time—detect dirt, spray, and squeegee! @fiercewildmad swag Wake me up. @danleifson Scrub floors. @planetmombalt Everything Rosie from The Jetsons did. @burlwoodcottage Put on a duvet cover. @erinvmahoney

Vacuum, but also know when the dog has thrown up so it doesn’t smear it everywhere. @aubynstjames Clean anything, especially floors and hard-to-reach places. @jobopdx Tidy up my kids’ mess. @libuddha Clean up the kitchen after cooking. @laurie_zing

The never-ending two: dishes and laundry. @klenkli Vacuum up dog hair continuously. @donnajean_jel lybean

Wash, sort, fold, and put away clothes. @jakob.wo Unload the dishwasher. @karosld

Cook a healthy dinner. @lyndymc

Take the garbage and recycling from the kitchen to the containers outside. @johnnytankofficial

Play with my dog while I’m at work. @simonbull

Fold laundry as soon as it finishes drying. @call_me_mart

Not become selfaware and murder me. @diabloagogo

Reply to Instagram surveys. @tonydrinkscoffee

JAN UARY/FEB RUARY 2022

ILLUSTRATION: ROBERT LÖNNQVIST I @RAKASTAJA_ROBERT

Change diapers. @elle.kitty

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dwell.com

COMMUNITY

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We asked an expert jury and our audience to choose the best projects of the year. Visit Dwell.com to see all the winners.

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Barbara Bestor

Chris Cornelius

Tosin Oshinowo

Bestor Architecture

Studio:Indigenous

cmDesign Atelier

Kulapat Yantrasast

Jared Blake and Ed Be

Why

Lichen

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Dwellings

Prefabs

WINNER CASA TER Using regional building techniques and local materials, Mesura created a sustainable retreat that blends with the Catalonian countryside.

WINNER CATERPILLAR Undecorated and Studio Detroit sliced up a prefab Quonset hut to create a series of light-filled dwellings in Detroit.

RUNNER-UP UC HOUSE Designed by Daniela Bucio Sistos, this brick-and-concrete residence on the outskirts of Morelia, Mexico, is anchored by a central open-air foyer that frames a library displaying the owners’ collection of more than 15,000 books.

RUNNER-UP CASA MIRADOR Rama Estudio used a prefab glass-and-steel box to extend a home outside Quito, Ecuador, into the surrounding landscape.

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ILLUSTRATIONS: SAM KERR (PORTRAITS); JENNIFER TAPIAS DERCH (ICONS THROUGHOUT). PHOTOS: SALVA LÓPEZ (CASA TER); DANE ALONSO (UC HOUSE); JASON KEEN (CATERPILLAR); JAG STUDIO (CASA MIRADOR)

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4

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PHOTOS: VARP STUDIO (MIT CHIT HOUSE); ONNIS LUQUE (CHIAPAS 168); RAFAEL SOLDI (LOOM HOUSE); ALEJANDRA HAUSER (CASA KEÇE); BENJAMIN RASMUSSEN (JESSE’S HOUSE); BYUN JONGSEOK (SERORO HOUSE); FRENCH + TYE (HOUSE RECAST); IKUYA SASAKI (RIVER HOUSE)

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“Lovely—it gives the feeling of being elevated among the trees.”

—Tosin Oshinowo on Mit Chit House

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Gardens

Renovations

Small Spaces

Bathrooms

WINNER MIT CHIT HOUSE In Bangkok, this family residence

by Looklen Architects features four courtyards with trees that stretch beyond the doubleheight interiors.

WINNER LOOM HOUSE On Bainbridge Island in Washington, Charlie Hellstern Interior Design and The Miller Hull Partnership collaborated on the first residential remodel to achieve Living Building Challenge certification.

WINNER JESSE’S HOUSE This micro-house in East Austin, Texas’s Community First! Village, a development of permanent, affordable housing, was designed by Jobe Corral Architects with input from its occupant, Jesse Brown, who previously spent 30 years without a home.

WINNER HOUSE RECAST Studio Ben Allen renovated a Victorian in London, using colored concrete. One of the new bathrooms is cast in green with an arch motif that appears throughout the home.

RUNNER-UP CHIAPAS 168 In the Roma district of Mexico City, Vertebral designed a fourunit apartment building with verdant terraces on every floor.

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RUNNER-UP CASA KEÇE In a nature preserve outside Paris, two creative directors turned an 1892 residence into a colorful country home for their young family.

RUNNER-UP SERORO HOUSE Minwook Choi of Smaller Architects designed a five-story tower of stacked sunlit rooms to be his family home on a 355-square-foot lot in Seoul.

RUNNER-UP RIVER HOUSE For a holiday home in Hokkaido, Japan, Tomoyuki Sudo of SAAD created a bathroom with an onsen that enjoys framed views of the landscape.

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dwell.com

7 9

“We love a light that looks great on or off, and this fits the bill.”

—Jared Blake

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Kitchens

Furniture

Lighting

Accessories

WINNER ROUND HOUSE Feldman Architecture reimagined a 1920s residence for a Los Altos Hills, California, family, placing a circular kitchen with an oculus at the center of the home.

WINNER THE SIDEKICK Russet’s side table, crafted from FSC-certified wood, is uncomplicated, affordable, and easy on the eye.

WINNER TALA X DAVID WEEKS TABLE LAMP In a collaboration with Tala, designer David Weeks created a series of four table lamps whose bulbs mirror their bases.

WINNER BEOSOUND LEVEL PORTABLE WI-FI SPEAKER Bang & Olufsen’s speaker features a slim profile, subverting the bulky designs that we’ve come to accept as required for high-quality audio.

RUNNER-UP BENT STREET In renovating a Melbourne Victorian, designer Kim Kneipp created a curvy kitchen, using recycled wood for the cabinetry.

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RUNNER-UP BENCHMARK IKLWA LOUNGE CHAIR Mac Collins drew on his African-Caribbean heritage for this design, using ideas rooted in Afrocentrism and Afrofuturism to create the chair’s spear-shaped arms and throne-like back. Its form is meant to empower the user.

RUNNER-UP TUTU 2.0 Available in several radiant colorways, the Tutu 2.0 by Mash.T is a striking interpretation of Xibelani skirts worn by Xitsonga women in South Africa.

RUNNER-UP CACTUS JUG 3 Ichendorf Milano’s playful but elegant pitcher maximizes how much it can hold by using a hollow handle and takes on the color of its contents.

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PHOTOS: ADAM ROUSE (ROUND HOUSE); LISA COHEN (BENT STREET)

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Book&Look. Pagnon & Pelhaître Made in France

P R O M OT I O N

Getting in Lockstep Level Home’s smart locks pair high design with an intuitive approach to home entry.

smartphone capabilities, homeowners are enjoying remote, keyless home entry without sacrificing peace of mind.

Unfortunately, most smart locks and dead bolts are bulky and unattractive. You obsessed for months over the bath fittings, tile grout, and kitchen cabinet pulls. Why would you settle for ugly front-door hardware? Enter a new wave of products from a Bay Area company that embraces both high functionality and high design.

Level is a leader in its class, with sleek locks and (coming this month) a streamlined keypad that can be placed in discreet locations away

from the front door. Its products can also adapt your existing dead bolts with invisible technology, allowing you to retain the style you want while gaining smart capabilities (and you won’t need to change the battery every few months).

On the whole, those who want to bring elegant, convenient access solutions to their homes have never been in a better position to do so. It’s a good time to be obsessed with the details—best to get it on lock.

Read more at dwell.com/level.

Level’s smart locks allow for frictionless home entry, giving you extra time to primp for the party.

ILLUSTRATION: PETER OUMANSKI

As Mies van der Rohe once said, God is in the details. Even the most masterful architectural achievement is nothing without its finishing touches. And when it comes to first impressions, not to mention security measures, no details make a bigger impact than the most essential parts of the front door—the hardware and lock.

Whether you need to accommodate house guests, short-term renters—there are now some four million residential hosts on Airbnb alone—or just a repair person coming by for a quick job, contemporary life requires frictionless, hands-free access. Using Bluetooth and

DWELL

LEVEL

The magic’s inside.

Unlock a world of wonder every time you open your door. The magic of Level lock is hidden on the inside. Entering and exiting your home has never felt, or looked, this beautiful.

level.co/dwell

The Invisible Smart Lock

houses we love

Grading on a Curve

COMMUNITY

A Swedish A-frame with a flourish excels in all seasons.

TEXT BY

PHOTOS BY

Tiffany Orvet

Staffan Andersson

Architect Måns Tham designed an A-frame cabin in Edsåsdalen, Sweden, with ample space for Anders Smedberg and his family to host large groups for year-round outdoor adventures. When the family isn’t staying there, Anders will rent out the five-bedroom home.

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When outdoor enthusiast and tech executive Anders Smedberg set out to build a mountain getaway for himself and his two teenage children among the ski slopes of Edsåsdalen in northern Sweden, he had a clear vision. He wanted a practical and comfortable alpine home inspired by the classic American A-frame, and he called on Stockholm architect Måns Tham—whose cousin designed a previous home of his—to help him create it.

Tham tweaked the basic A-frame concept to reflect the home’s Scandinavian

context. He added curved aluminum dormers that swing out from the prefabricated aluminum roof and wood frame, evoking the kåta (huts) used by the Sámi, an Indigenous people of several Nordic countries, as well as the branches of the trees that surround the home. The front and rear elevations will also pick up the silvery hues of nearby birches as their Kebony wood cladding patinates over time.

The swooping roofline allows light to flow through large windows into a spacious interior discreetly divided by sliding

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The interior walls, ceilings, and built-ins are clad in Siberian larch. Tham placed the glazed openings and doorways to maintain clear sight lines throughout the long and narrow home.

A fireplace in the living room (left) features glazed clay bricks from Swedish manufacturer Tegelbolaget.

pocket doors. The roughly 30-by-82-foot two-level house includes five bedrooms and can easily sleep up to a dozen people, a capacity meant to give the home longevity.

“I was thinking long-term,” says Anders, who lives in Stockholm but—like many Swedes—loves the family fjällhus (mountain house) tradition. “I can stay here with my kids even when they have families of their own.”

Large groups also fit comfortably in the open-plan kitchen and lounge, where floor-to-ceiling and picture windows frame impressive alpine views. The

ground floor is anchored by a glazedbrick fireplace with a curved firebox that echoes the unique shape of the roofline.

Upstairs, this motif returns in the central den, where the Siberian larch ceiling sweeps up to the roof’s ridge.

The window- and wood-lined interiors will be a beacon for Anders and his guests returning from outdoor activities throughout the year, be they skiing in winter or bicycling in the summer. It’s a nice place for unwinding, too: Near the entrance, a room for removing gear connects to a spa area with a sauna.

“The tent-like shape resembles a mountain. When the snow falls, the triangle becomes embedded in the landscape.”

MÅNS THAM, ARCHITECT

More at Dwell.com Do you have a project you’d like to see published in Houses We Love? Share it at dwell.com/add-a-home

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P R O M OT I O N

The Château de La Chaize vineyard and its newly restored chai (storeroom) are all registered as French historical monuments.

Set across 990 acres of landscaped grounds and vineyards in Burgundy’s southern Beaujolais region, the 17th-century estate and winery Château de La Chaize boasts an elegant design based on the golden ratio—a mathematical proportion commonly found in nature—and it remains a quintessential French domain.

What you don’t see, says Didier Repellin, the French architect who recently restored the property, is the brilliance of its original makers and artisans: the carpenters, the masons, the stonecutters—the engineers and painters. “We sometimes forget that historical monuments are not only a date or a style of architecture, but a celebration of human genius,” Repellin says.

So what, exactly, has been changed with the renovation? To the untrained eye, not much.

(And that, says Repellin, equals success.) But under Christophe Gruy, entrepreneur and DWELL

CHÂTEAU DE LA CHAIZE

chairman of the Lyon-based Maïa Group, who purchased the estate in 2017, the adjustments to Château de La Chaize are massive. For one, the entire estate is now dedicated to introducing sustainable practices and features, including using solar power for all of its equipment, recycling to achieve zero waste, and building a geothermal heating and cooling system.

When it comes to wine production, the goal is to be certified organic in time for this year’s harvest.

It’s no wonder that now, centuries later, the current architect tasked with updating the estate is more enamored of conservation than total renovation. “If it is good, why would we touch it?” Repellin asks. “On the contrary, we must amplify it. This is a true opportunity to allow the monument to continue to live by adapting it to contemporary needs.”

Read more at dwell.com/chaize.

PHOTOS: SERGE CHAPUIS (TOP); JEAN-LUC MÈGE PHOTOGRAPHY (BOTTOM)

A 17th-Century Château in France Gets a Sustainability-Focused Restoration

EDITED BY

PHOTOS BY // @JAMIECHUNGSTUDIO

Margaret Rhodes

Jamie Chung

> RE S E ARC H & DE VE LOP M E N T

We gathered a list of new gadgetry for growing families and organized it around common threads—from security to creativity.

We also spoke with the creators of noteworthy new inventions and spaces and asked them why their work will transform how we think about raising kids in a digital era. And, on their advice, we added some low-tech objects to the mix as well.

// PLUGGED -IN PARENTING For families with kids, choosing how much technology to have in the home can produce no small amount of anxiety. The makers of the latest wave of devices aim to enhance rather than overwhelm your environment.

The Moxie robot strikes one of its many friendly—if slightly uncanny—expressions.

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OBJECTO W4 HYBRID HUMIDIFIER < Known for its design-minded spin on air-quality gadgets‚ Objecto has produced an ultra-quiet humidifier with an array of controls that‚ among other things‚ adjust mist output and aroma tabs to diffuse essential oils for wind-down time.

_The Senses A new wave of devices proposes to improve how kids experience the world, striving to support everything from sleep quality to balance and coordination.

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// PLUGG E D - I N PARE NT I NG

Eyrún Eggertsdóttir >>A mom-turned-entrepreneur designed a sleep-aid sensation.

RÓRÓ LULLA DOLL > Designed to soothe fussy infants and help them sleep—as if next to their caregivers all night—this plush” unassuming doll contains a speaker that plays a recording of the breathing and heartbeat of a resting adult.

SENSORY PLAY SPACE DIVIDER < This plywood divider can be almost anything your kid wants it to be: Five perforated panels swivel to become a castle” cave” or fort. Squishy tubes and colorful felt balls make it extra tactile.

WOBBEL BOARD > Something between a slide and a rocking horse” the Wobbel is an analog way to test balance and build spatial awareness—perfect for little surfers-in-training.

HATCH REST+ < The Tesla of night-lights” the Rest+ comes with a dimmable clock and a timeto-rise function for sleep training” all controlled by the Hatch Sleep app.

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Basic biology is often a powerful form of technology. Consider newborns: According to studies—most recently in scientific journals like Scientific Reports and Children—keeping infants in close proximity to a heartbeat and steady breathing can promote neurological development and healthy sleep.

But that kind of contact isn’t available to all infants” especially those in neonatal units. That got young Icelandic mother Eyrún Eggertsdóttir wondering: Why hadn’t someone designed a device that could mimic those biorhythms?

Eggertsdóttir took on the project herself and created Lulla” a pillowy doll with velvety-soft fabric and a folksy look. Lulla (in Iceland “go to lúlla” is like saying “nighty-night”) functions as a sleep aid” thanks to an internal audio unit that emits heartbeat and breathing sounds recorded with a kundalini yoga instructor. If that seems vaguely dystopic, Eggertsdóttir is aware. But when she studied similar devices” she found that the gadgets played unnaturally fast heartbeats or white noise—synthetic sounds that were hardly lifelike. “We’re trying to copy Mother Nature because she’s got the best solutions”” says Eggertsdóttir” who landed on Lulla’s 75 “heartbeats” per minute and 65-decibel maximum volume level after chatting with doctors and nurses at a neonatal unit. Lulla also eschews other common sleep aids that its creator finds even more absurd than a simulated human heartbeat. It wouldn’t make sense for Lulla to come with 10 light settings or a menu of sounds” she says” because “sleeping people don’t make whale sounds all of a sudden.”

Initially produced via crowdfunding” Lulla was a hit from inception” winning awards” selling out multiple times” and eliciting effusive online parental praise.

That fandom prompted RóRó (Lulla’s parent company) to introduce in 2020 the Lulla Owl, which straps to the side of a crib to make it safe for babies younger than 12 months” and this year RóRó plans to release a larger doll just for toddlers and older children” as well as a soothing pillow for adults.

—Alexandra Ilyashov

_Security A smart bassinet and a better baby monitor are only the beginning when it comes to new products that promise peace of mind.

NANIT PRO CAMERA < “Monitor” is a funny word for the Nanit Pro‚ which goes beyond mere observation to track your baby’s rest via a breathing band and deliver a daily sleep report—plus tips on how to improve your little one’s snoozing.

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// PLUGG E D - I N PARE NT I NG

Priya Patel & Esther Beke of 4|MATIV SNOO < This much-talked-about bassinet uses a responsive sound and motion system to calm cranky babies automatically. Now the company is leasing the Smart Sleeper to make intelligent sleep training more accessible.

CASEMATE AIRTAG KIDS BRACELET > Using an AirTag to keep tabs on your kid’s location works only if the AirTag stays on said kid. CaseMate’s bracelet makes that easy: The silicone strap looks like a watchband and holds the tracking device in place.

CHAMP PORTABLE CHARGER < Parents are probably used to hearing “but my phone died!” when their teens forget to check in. Barely larger than a deck of cards, Champ’s portable charger has a battery that lasts up to three days and can charge two devices at once. No more excuses for your kids—or their friends.

AWAIR ELEMENT > The Element combines airquality tracking capabilities with Braun-like design, making it easy (and aesthetically pleasing) to keep tabs on indoor particulate matter, VOCs, and carbon dioxide.

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>>The interior designers are making classrooms more hands-on.

Step inside Maple Street School in Brooklyn, New York, and you might wonder if you came to the right place.

The maple-paneled space looks more like a start-up than a drop-off site for kids—until you notice that the countertops and plastic chairs are knee-high.

Local studio 4|MATIV designed the space “to express the school’s ethos‚” which prioritizes a tactile‚ flexible environment‚ says architect Priya Patel.

Patel runs 4|MATIV with interior and industrial designer Esther Beke; for their educational clients‚ the duo create environments that are low-tech and stimulate the senses. At the entrance to Maple Street School‚ a colorful wood pegboard gets kids playing immediately‚ taking their attention away from being separated from whoever brought them. At Mi Casita Preschool‚ another site in Brooklyn designed by the team‚ pint-size nooks line the walls‚ creating an indoor playscape. The designers prefer to use organic materials‚ like wood and nubby natural textiles‚ to add tactile surfaces where possible. “Our approach is driven by the idea of play rather than a sense of design‚” says Patel‚ citing pedagogies like the Bank Street Developmental Interactive Model‚ which states that children learn best when they get hands-on engagement with materials‚ and the Reggio Emilia approach‚ which touts the benefits of self-directed, experiential learning.

Schools often operate on tight budgets‚ but 4|MATIV wants to prove that its preferred materials—natural‚ low-VOC‚ made to be touched—can often be just as economical as vinyl flooring. The Daltile communal sink at Maple Street‚ for instance‚ is an affordable alternative to one clad in porcelain. Some of 4|MATIV’s material choices (such as recycled flooring and LED lighting options) have been added to the New York School Construction Authority’s approved list of safe specifications. “Though the schools we’ve worked with have tight budgets‚ we’ve added an incredible amount of value to their curriculum‚” Beke says. “Design can support the business of education.” —Kari Costas

LOGITECH POP KEYS < Logitech’s wireless‚ candycolored Pop Keys keyboards have “typewriter-style” mechanical keys with a retro feel but are very much designed for the young users of today. They come with eight programmable emoji keys and 12 shortcut keys for voice-to-text memos and quick muting during video calls or class.

_Connection These conduits of communication and emotional intelligence are designed to make kids feel closer at a time when so much in our lives is remote.

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// PLUGG E D - I N PARE NT I NG

Dan Avida & Daphne Koller >>The husband-and-wife duo are trying to design a better online classroom.

EMBODIED MOXIE > The Moxie educational robot looks like a Pixar character with its range of facial expressions but comes packed with machine learning technology that enables it to provide its kid-owner personalized lessons on storytelling‚ mindfulness‚ and emotional regulation.

YOTO PLAYER < Yoto is a full-service bedside companion: Besides night light, alarm clock, and sleep-training functions, its audio player keeps kids entertained. Little ones just pop in a card to hear classic stories, meditation prompts, or sleep sounds.

PALOMAR CITYRADIO > The CityRadio almost looks like a toy, but it tunes in to 60,000 stations from 18 cities around the world.

FRIENDSHIP LAMPS < Even in our hyper-connected age‚ these Wi-Fi lanterns offer a novel way to say‚ “Just thinking of you.” Tap yours to change the color of a companion lantern at a friend or relative’s house anywhere in the world.

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When the pandemic hit, Dan Avida and Daphne Koller saw their two daughters’ schooling change overnight. “We didn’t think they were getting a particularly good education on Zoom‚ which was designed for video conferencing‚ not learning‚” says Avida. The couple saw their kids checking out social media or even movies during class. So Avida‚ a tech entrepreneur‚ and Koller‚ a computer scientist who cofounded Coursera‚ the online education platform‚ in 2012‚ started thinking about what a product designed specifically for online classrooms might look like. Engageli went live seven months later.

Engageli organizes students into virtual tables of up to 10 each‚ an idea Avida and Koller got from their daughters‚ whose high school uses a similar collaborative setup instead of individual desks. This lets a student ask a peer for help‚ rather than interrupt the entire class‚ giving both students a moment to synthesize the lesson in question.

The tables allow for smaller side conversations in a fluid way that Zoom or Google Meet does not.

For teachers who might wonder if students are paying attention during a presentation‚ Engageli includes a system of visual tags that appear on students’ screens as quick polls and quizzes. This streamlines the lesson by cutting down on toggling between slides‚ and the quiz results give instructors an idea of who’s still tuning in.

Engageli licenses directly with institutions—for now‚ mostly higher ed—and is young enough that it’s measuring success by how many have adopted the platform. But the start-up has also raised $47.5 million‚ at least some of which will go toward collecting more feedback from instructors and students on how to improve the user experience.

The company is geared toward bridging in-person and online learning so that students feel equally connected in both settings. —AI

_Creativity Storytelling, bot building, and noise making are just a few of the activities that the creators of these artful objects hope to inspire.

LOOG PRO ELECTRIC GUITAR < Designed for junior rock stars‚ Loog’s colorful guitars pare the instrument down to just three strings so kids can get comfortable with basic chords. A companion app comes with video lessons‚ a tuner‚ and a digital songbook.

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Meghan Talarowski TEENAGE ENGINEERING POCKET OPERATORS < The maestros of on-the-go audio equipment keep expanding their line of Pocket Operator music recording devices by releasing new iterations tricked out with voice and percussion sound samples.

STUDIO ROOF INSECTS > Bring the outdoors inside with brightly hued paper bees and butterflies designed by Studio Roof in Amsterdam. Composed of recycled cardboard and vegetable ink” these insects double as 3-D puzzles and vibrant art for the wall.

LUNII MY FABULOUS STORYTELLER < If you’re questioning your little one’s screen time, swap out the iPad for Lunii’s My Fabulous Storyteller, a screen-free interactive gadget for listening to audio stories. Kids choose the hero, an object, and location; then Lunii spins a yarn.

KIWICO ELECTRONICS KIT > Known for its diverse array of science and art kits” KiwiCo has created the Electronics 4-Pack. The bundle includes toys for the budding teenage engineer who wants to tinker with circuits and sensors and wind up with a working robot or laser projector.

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>>The landscape architect is making playgrounds less predictable—and kids more resilient.

Meghan Talarowski thinks we should let kids fall down more often. The landscape architect, who leads Philadelphia’s Studio Ludo, designs playgrounds for a living and believes in a riskier” more open-ended version of play—picture higher climbing structures” faster” scarier slides” and more labyrinthine hideaways for getting lost.

“Part of play is learning how to navigate environments and our own bodies”” she says. “We provide places where kids might get their head stuck somewhere.”

Talarowski first developed her thesis in 2015 while living in London as a new mom” after she noticed the city’s playgrounds were less manicured than American ones. She applied her research background to finding out why and spent six months observing 18”000 visitors across 16 playgrounds.

The study brought to light the formulaic nature of American playgrounds” which prioritize safety and therefore limit play to a controlled” linear exercise when research shows it’s anything but.

“Play is full of anarchy”” Talarowski says” but instead of encouraging that” “we spend a lot of time telling kids what to do and how to act.” Modern parental values also stress the importance of success at an increasingly young age; by kindergarten” anarchy has succumbed to achievement metrics. It’s a trend she views with alarm, pointing to research on “kindergarten burnout” that describes ways in which academic rigor may stifle young children. Free play, however, lets kids develop a sense of creativity and resilience.

While Talarowski can’t always convince clients to go along with her completely, she’s still able to get planners to agree that not everything needs to be as easily identifiable as a simple swing. For the Northwest Resiliency Park in Hoboken” New Jersey” she’s creating huge tree houses reached via ladder tunnels. For an upcoming project in Omaha” she designed a fractured wooden deck-like structure covered in hammocks and bridges. Those expecting a traditional playground might find it confusing. If you ask Talarowski” that’s precisely the point. —KC

<

WILLOW BREAST PUMP Now on its third design iteration‚ the Willow wearable breast pump is a mobile solution for what used to be a cumbersome‚ inconvenient process. The cordless pump fits inside a bra and relays milk output data to an app.

_Health These technology companies have developed new gadgetry for the body and the mind—from eating well with ease to learning to meditate from an adorable turtle.

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Dan Judkins >>The former toy designer is tackling tech for the “fourth trimester.”

LITTLEHIPPO MELLA > Children can name colors years before they grasp hours and minutes, so set the Mella with your desired wake time and teach early risers to wait until the clock glows green before they get out of bed.

HATCH GROW < During the early days when you’re not sure if your baby is eating enough‚ this smart scale—which doubles as a diaper-changing pad and syncs with an app—can help you track weight changes between doctor’s visits.

ZENIMAL KIDS + > Get little ones started on mindfulness early with Zenimal. Part Headspace‚ part toy‚ this silicone turtle’s shell doubles as a remotecontrol panel for nine guided meditations and three sleep tracks.

BEABA BABYCOOK < Starting kids on solid foods can be challenging. The Babycook aims to make it easier by turning raw ingredients into cooked and pureed food in 15 minutes.

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For parents who breastfeed, a new addition to the family often comes with a clunky gadget for whenever the baby isn’t available to nurse: a breast pump‚ traditionally a leaky‚ loud device that keeps its user tethered to an outlet and hidden behind closed doors. That changed in 2017‚ when Willow and design partner Ideo launched a wearable breast pump, one of the first of its kind.

(Other manufacturers soon followed suit.) Unlike older pumps‚ which rely on tubes and plastic bottles‚ Willow’s rounded devices sit discreetly inside a bra‚ track pumping progress‚ and relay that data to a companion app. It presents more as a brush with Apple than a trip to a 1970s-era hospital.

But unlike a smartphone or a laptop‚ nursing technology can work only if it suits all chests‚ and bodies come in many sizes and belong to people with unique preferences. So in 2020, Willow lured its current chief product officer‚ Dan Judkins‚ away from Hasbro‚ where he’d developed connected games and toys. “They’ve disrupted a category‚ and that’s motivating‚” says Judkins of his new employer. His job is to make good on that disruption by building out an ecosystem of products that take full advantage of Willow’s marquee technology. (Designing a pumping system as a non-breastfeeder “felt weird for half a day‚” Judkins admits‚ but adds that “as a designer‚ you don’t design for yourself‚ you design for other people.”)

So far‚ Judkins is finding that the company’s high-tech pumping system needs some low-tech infrastructure to increase performance‚ which‚ at Willow‚ gets measured as milk output.

As of now that includes silicone inserts to accommodate different nipple sizes and an adjustable‚ wireless bra with mesh panels to hold the pumps. These novel touch points promise to make the newly digitized pumping process more efficient‚ accessible‚ and dignified. Willow’s sizing inserts‚ for instance‚ can be used with non-Willow breast pumps—an acknowledgment of how expensive it is to acquire new baby gear. “We just try to make things as easy as possible‚” Judkins says. —AI

conversation

TEXT BY

Youngna Park PORTRAIT BY

Sam Kerr

The technology journalist and mother of three suspects that when it comes to parenting gadgetry, less is more.

ILLUSTRATIONS BY | @DGRAYBARNETT

Daniel Gray-Barnett

Sophie Brickman If it comes right down to it, better to trust your gut than countless online sources and high-tech monitors to understand why your baby is fussing—you know your child better than anyone. In broad strokes, that’s the conclusion tech journalist Sophie Brickman reaches in her book, Baby, Unplugged: One Mother’s Search for Balance, Reason, and Sanity in the Digital Age, which came out last fall.

Brickman remembers that when her husband was starting out as a tech entrepreneur, he was always strapping newfangled devices onto himself and getting happily lost in his biometric data. A food writer at the time, Brickman basically paid no mind. But then she became a parent, and she let him persuade her that the 38

wearable gadget he brought home to monitor their newborn’s heart rate and oxygen levels added an extra layer of safety. So she wrapped it onto baby Ella, and they all went off to sleep. That night, an alarm awoke the couple in a panic.

While Ella slept on peacefully, her frantic parents eventually discovered the problem’s source: a disrupted Wi-Fi connection. A realization hit Brickman: Perhaps technology was actually delivering more agitation than peace of mind.

Brickman, now a mother of three and a (mostly parenting tech) columnist at the Guardian, is not anti-technology. But as her book title suggests, it’s all about balance—and erring on the side of what inspires your kid’s imagination

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off-screen. We asked her to tell us how we can figure out where the dividing lines are and how to use our best judgment.

Do you think technology can alleviate parental anxiety?

Technology generally promises that it’s going to simplify your life, calm you down, or optimize something. So, if it’s going to optimize parenting, it’s going to improve your kid’s sleep schedule or make them smarter by putting them in front of the right screens. But in the process of doing all this, technology presents you with data that make you aware of a lot of things that ultimately are not important—but when you’re a parent, and those pieces of information are about your most precious thing in the world, it’s very hard not to fixate on them.

Overall, technology’s promise is not borne out in parenting. Give your kid a cardboard box and they’ll do all sorts of things with it. It’s really good for their motor skills, imagination, and resilience.

Boredom is good for kids.

How do you determine kids’ readiness for screens as they get older?

One doctor I spoke to at the American Academy of Pediatrics said that an easy

Brickman’s book, Baby, Unplugged: One Mother’s Search for Balance, Reason, and Sanity in the Digital Age, which came out last year, mixes stories from her personal life as a mother with her professional experience as a journalist to explore the potentials and pitfalls of current parenting technologies.

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test to see whether or not a kid is old enough to handle a technology is to give it to them and then take it away and see what happens. If you give your kid a book and then take it away, chances are they’re not going to have a real meltdown. But I used to give Ella an iPad, and when I took it away, there would be kicking, screaming, and crying. It’s a smart way of getting a handle on whether or not the technology is too much for your kid.

What screen time guidelines do you follow in your house?

It’s less what’s on the screen and more how you’re using it. There’s a lot of great programming out there—you just have to know how to find it. If you’re using the screen as a jumping-off point for you and your kid to watch something together and then talk about it later, that can be great.

As most parents know, if you put a kid in front of a TV, their jaw drops open, and it can be hard to get their attention.

That’s not the best thing in the world. So consider the best programming for them and also how to use it in a way that is

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enriching. Realizing this was a big release for me, because I became more comfortable putting my daughter in front of the TV every once in a while.

What advice about technology would you give to parents who are expecting their first child?

The technology that I introduced into my household gave me anxiety more than it calmed me down. After researching it, I realized that the less technology in the house, the better I felt as a parent.

My other piece of advice for all parents is to pick a “rabbi.” By that I mean pick a couple of people and have them be the ones you turn to for advice. For me, that’s my mom and my pediatrician. And, of course, there are friends I will text in the middle of the night and be like, Oh, my God, he’s not sleeping again. What do I do? But if you have just a few people you really trust, they will likely be way better for you than turning to social media, blogs, and things like that.

What technology makes it easier and more manageable to be a parent?

I can think of two concrete things that I rely on: One is my WhatsApp chain with my close girlfriends. It’s something that is constantly going on in the background, and it’s like a social outlet for me.

The other thing is FaceTime. I know we have so much Zoom fatigue, but particularly during the early, scary parts of the pandemic, being able to have my parents speak to my kids with relative regularity was very comforting. It’s isolating to be a parent, so I think being able to use technology to expand your village, in whatever ways, is really wonderful.

want to teach your kids to be able to amuse themselves and to play. This is not as easy as putting them in front of a device—it takes work—and we don’t always have the time to do that work.

I think the notion of our age right now is that every moment needs to be more and more enriched. But if you know that when your kids are just playing with some blocks on the floor, they are becoming smarter and more resilient and more emotionally connected, then you might not feel the need to put them in front of a screen as much.

I think the best that you can do is minimize screen time, especially for kids under the age of five. Ella is now five and a half, and it’s not like a switch flipped in her, but she can understand a lot more on her own with apps that are smartly designed than she could a few years ago.

Who do you think parenting tech is serving?

For the most part, it’s serving anxious parents who have lots of disposable income.

Not many parents can afford the $400 baby monitor. The technology is not, at this point, incredibly affordable.

I think that Silicon Valley is hoping it’s going to trickle down and that devices will become more affordable. Right now, though, tech capitalizes on the anxiety of parents, who have been anxious for millennia. When I started researching mothers groups from the 1850s, they were hilariously going through the same things.

Parental anxiety doesn’t change from generation to generation. What is slightly different now is that technology is ever present, so whatever anxiety that we had before seems to be amplified, because it exists online in a million forums.

“ You know your kid better than anybody else, so trust that you’re doing the right thing, and try to minimize your anxiety, because you’re not doing anything wrong.””

SOPHIE BRICKMAN

There are many people who lean on screen time because they have to work and don’t have childcare—disproportionately lower-income families and people of color. How do you think about healthy habits around screens in these circumstances?

I feel like parents across the socioeconomic spectrum wish they didn’t have to rely on technology, specifically on screens. We wish kids could be entertained and enriched in a different way, but we don’t have the support that we need as a society.

I think there comes a moment at which screens can actually be quite beneficial, but for very young kids, boredom and free play are where the magic happens. You 42

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prefab

TEXT BY

PHOTOS BY | @REINIS_HOFMANIS

Vejay Nair

Reinis Hofmanis

Only the Essentials With natural materials and an unfussy attitude, a Latvian prefab embraces the countryside.

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Thirty-seven miles north of the Latvian capital of Riga, in a coastal meadow fringed by apple trees, Laura Dislere, a production designer, and Maris Locmelis, a photographer, created a retreat for recharging after busy weeks in the city.

To minimize the hassle of on-site construction, they chose a 495-square-foot prefabricated carbon-negative home designed in Riga and constructed from locally sourced timber in Jelgava, a town less than 65 miles away from the site. The Ray, as the line of homes is named, is made by Manta North, a Latvian manufacturer of efficient prefabs that have proven popular in Nordic nations. The company recently expanded to Switzerland and Germany, and it plans to enter the U.S. market this year. As Raimonds Gusarevs, Manta North’s CEO, puts it, “People are catching on to this idea of having a small, minimalist, and sustainable dwelling.”

Laura and Maris were drawn to the design’s natural materials, like the oak parquet flooring and the oil-treated crosslaminated timber walls, as well as its massive 8.9-by-8.9-foot, floor-to-ceiling

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prefab

“ The scent of the wood reminds me of that calming feeling you get walking in the forest on a warm autumn day.”

LAURA DISLERE, RESIDENT

On a tranquil site in Skulte Parish, Latvia, prefab manufacturer Manta North delivered a compact home for Laura Dislere and Maris Locmelis (opposite).

The living room (above) is furnished with a Söderhamn sofa from Ikea, artwork by Latvianborn painter Vidvuds Zviedris, and a dining table and chairs from Mint Furniture. “They fit

with the aesthetics of the house and the minimalistic feel of it,” says Laura. “Plus they are made locally, which is also important for us.” The bedroom (right) features a bed from Mint, a Selene bathtub from Aura, and a wooden side table made by Maris’s father, Henriks. The land (below) has been in Laura’s family for generations.

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window. “It allows you to feel connected to nature,” says Maris as he reminisces with Laura about standing barefoot on the heated floors while watching the snow fall on a freezing winter morning.

The front door opens to a compact kitchen and a living area the couple have outfitted with neutral textiles and locally made furnishings by the Latvian brand Mint Furniture. For Laura—whose grandfather bought the land where the home now sits—spending summers isolated in the countryside as a child felt like an obligation, but the new home makes her see the place in a different light. “When I am here, I have two different feelings: comfort and humbleness,” says Laura. “There’s only one table and bed, but it feels luxurious.”

The home is close enough to Riga that Laura and Maris can visit weekly, and they are planning on building their own little world around it. Maris intends to construct a traditional Latvian sauna, and Laura is laying the groundwork for a garden. For now, Laura says they are taking it easy: “We’re just enjoying the view and enjoying life.”

4”

ILLUSTRATION: LOHNES+WRIGHT

Wood features prominently in the home’s design—from the cross-laminated timber walls and oak floorboards to the pine deck, which Maris built. The couple, who live in Riga, enjoy connecting to a provincial lifestyle, which they have come to prefer over the city. “I think we have found our space. Our new energy is here,” says Laura.

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Time Test of

A prairie-style Portland, Oregon, home’s unique brick facade was left untouched.

Inside, the kitchen was relocated to the sunny side of the house. Avocado mattresses are incorporated into all the bedrooms as part of the residents’ commitment to healthy, sustainable living.

PHOTOS: DWELL CREATIVE SERVICES

Lever Architecture infuses a century-old Oregon home with new life while honoring its quirks.

There’s no dearth of cute Craftsmans in Portland, but the prairie-style home with a clinker brick facade that Anyeley Hallová and Ed Halla discovered on a double corner lot was a rare find. “The home is straight-up magical,” Anyeley says. When they came across it, the couple scrapped plans to build from scratch and jumped at the chance to renovate something unique. They brought in Lever Architecture, which introduced more indoor/outdoor living spaces and opened up the interiors, ensuring that the residence will remain relevant into the next century. “The remodel was always about a dialogue between the old and the new,” says Ed. The goal was to retrofit the home for Anyeley and Ed’s busy family of four, paying particular attention to incorporating nontoxic and sustainable materials. “We know that buildings contribute to around 40 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, so we wanted to DWELL

AVOCADO

be responsible,” says Anyeley, adding that they opted for quality insulation, low-VOC products, and energy-efficient infrastructure at every turn.

That attention to materials extends to certified organic, zero-waste mattresses from Avocado. The primary bedroom, after all, was designed with the feel of a “Scandinavian or spa-like environment,” says Ed. There are no distractions, no television, no overstimulation— just soft textures and calming shades of gray.

The couple enjoy the enduring, historical character of their prairie-style gem, but now the home better reflects their personalities.

Anyeley reiterates the project’s guiding concept: “We wanted to focus on design choices, however small, that don’t contribute to any negative effects on the environment and create a healthy, resilient home for our family.”

Learn more at dwell.com/avocado.

P R O M OT I O N

“J Geiger shades are elegant, quiet, and high-performing,” says architect Damien Busillo of DLB Custom Home Design.

J Geiger’s Inception Shades deliver sleek design and smart-home capabilities.

As transparent canvases, windows have adaptable personalities: They keep a low profile or demand a lot of attention. When it comes to the former approach, it’s safe to say that shade maker J Geiger—known for its spare, streamlined aesthetic—is the embodiment of elegant simplicity. “Minimalist principles apply to all our products, and this is especially true for the Inception line,” says James Geiger of his latest collection, which marries contemporary design, smart functionality, and quick installation.

“Before Inception, we built all of our shading systems on-site to achieve the cleanest aesthetic possible, but labor-intensive installations come with a significant cost,” Geiger says. “Inception Shades arrive ready to install, delivering the same industry-leading look with 10 percent of the labor investment.” When paired with high-performance wireless technology and voice-control options, such as Google Home and Alexa, Inception delivers DWELL

J GEIGER

huge returns on an accelerated timeline.

Geiger adds, “A decade ago, it would have been unimaginable to think we could upgrade a home to motorized shades that are voice controlled in a single day. Today, it is not only possible—it’s easy.”

A minimalist aesthetic that complements, not competes with, your home’s architecture and uncomplicated controls make Inception Shades a go-to solution for many designers, including architect Damien Busillo of DLB Custom Home Design. He appreciates their lean profile and versatility: “The shades virtually disappear, but when needed during different times of the day, they feel as if they had always been a part of the window design,” Busillo says. Geiger agrees, describing Inception Shades as “agnostic enough to blend into any style of home.”

Learn more at dwell.com/jgeiger.

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Minimal Impact

by J G E I G E R

R E Q U E S T A N E S T I M AT E > I N C E P T I O N S H A D E S . C O M

interiors

TEXT BY

PHOTOS BY | @MATTDUTILE

Nikhita Mahtani

Matt Dutile

Undivided Intention A Brooklyn loft renovation eschews walls to keep things bright and flexible.

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ILLUSTRATION: LOHNES+WRIGHT

interiors

An open floor plan often begs for walls.

But carving up an old, 1,200-square-foot loft in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, was not an option for New York architecture practice New Affiliates.

The firm’s clients, who’d been living in the largely open-plan apartment for two years, hoped to maintain its airy feel while also introducing defined rooms. Though the space has large windows, they are all on one side, and walls would have turned the interior into a cave. Besides, “if you’re going to live in a loft, embrace an open lifestyle,” says Craig Redman, an artist and illustrator who shares the space with his partner, fashion executive Thomas Chen, and their art and design collection.

New Affiliates supported the choice.

“The space, as we found it, was actually quite beautiful. They had these gorgeous

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To make their Brooklyn loft (above) more livable, Craig Redman, left, and Thomas Chen worked with architecture firm New Affiliates to gently define “rooms” within the open plan. The couple’s cat, Pinot, keeps watch on Craig’s desk

(opposite), which faces the sleeping alcove. A heavy curtain curves around the bed to give sleepers more quiet and privacy.

A Cloud Softlight pendant by Molo helps demarcate the living area, bounded by a Le Bambole sofa by Mario Bellini.

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A partial wall anchors the kitchen on one side (above) and houses closets on the other (left). The structure creates a dressing area while allowing natural light to reach the far end of the loft. New

Affiliates inserted a window high in the bathroom wall to let that light in a bit farther. Craig and Thomas infused the surfaces of the space with their bold taste by alternating the orientation of

the wood grain in the millwork veneer panels to create a lively pattern. Craig designed the wood desk with benday–like perforations that disperse the sunlight (below).

giant windows, and it was full of light,” says Jaffer Kolb, the firm’s coprincipal.

The loft retains remnants of the industrial past of its four-story, cast-iron building, including a brick wall spanning most of the space. “Our first thought,” says Kolb, “was, We just can’t mess this up. It has such great bones.”

The layout presented challenges nonetheless. “The organization of the space didn’t work,” says Kolb, adding that the kitchen was dark and badly needed an overhaul. New Affiliates solved multiple problems at once with a custom island installed toward the back of the loft. The structure has an open kitchen on one side, facing out to the sunny dining and living areas, while its backside is lined with closets and a hidden laundry area, creating a semiprivate hallway adjacent to the bathroom. “The apartment has a fluid way of transitioning between spaces,” says New Affiliates coprincipal Ivi Diamantopoulou.

Bringing natural light to the back of the space was key to the new design, 52

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interiors

“ We want to have something that’s a little quirky but still classic enough that it’s not going to be out of date soon.”

THOMAS CHEN, RESIDENT

Artworks made by Craig and Thomas’s friends complement a coffee table by Faye Toogood and a foam chair by Wentrcek Zebulon. The couple made the papier-mâché side table last year, “at the height of pandemic boredom,” says Craig.

says Diamantopoulou. She and Kolb did this, in part, by rounding the edges of the island’s millwork. “That curve allows the light to refract and come into the entryway in a much different way than if it were a hard corner,” explains Kolb.

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relocated the bedroom area from its dark corner in the back to an alcove by the windows. A curtain, when needed, curves along a custom track around the space to provide privacy, and the material is dense enough to block noise from the street.

Craig and Thomas chose the curtain’s

vibrant shade of blue—one of many design decisions they influenced.

“We were riffing off their ideas about not wanting this to be a white-on-white space,” says Kolb, “but to feel full of color and life.” Walls, it turns out, would have just gotten in the way.

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INTRODUCING THE

ILLUSTRATION: JOANNA GROCHOCKA

Dwell Wine Club

Monthly subscriptions for all tastes.

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Laura Mauk PHOTOS BY | @JRCARRANCA_PHOTOGRAPHY

João Carranca

High Art Perched on a Portuguese hilltop, an inspiring studio lets creativity take flight.

Visual artist Amélia Marta enlisted Portuguese architecture firm Madeiguincho to design a space where she could stargaze, make art, or just sit and think. To create the multipurpose but still economical interior, the designers got inventive with windows and wood. The translucent timber-frame eastern facade lets in diffuse light perfect for painting, while a north-facing skylight illuminates a counter for metalworking (left). Along the western wall, a built-in birch plywood bench provides a place for Amélia to rest (right).

A sink station on the southern side (opposite, below) helps for cleanup and ceramic making.

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“I’m in love with the round window, the transparency of the ceiling, and the smell of wood and paint that’s always present. The space inspires me every day.”

AMÉLIA MARTA, RESIDENT

Before Covid shut almost everything down, artist Amélia Marta of Cascais, Portugal, used to rent studio space in various local workshops. But when the pandemic struck, like people the world over, she was forced to get flexible and began working out of her living room. It wasn’t ideal. “I was limited in terms of tools and space—not to mention the mess I was making,” she says.

After weeks of stepping around paint canvases, glazing brushes, and metal scraps, Amélia—a painter, ceramicist, and jewelry maker—began imagining a workspace of her own and inquired about who designed the modest yoga studio she frequented. The artist learned that the architects were from local firm Madeiguincho, led by Gonçalo Marrote. She commissioned Marrote and two of his colleagues, João Brás Nogueira Filipe and Nicholas Sartori Gennari, to design a roughly 270-square-foot studio on a hilltop overlooking the coastal town’s red-tile roofs and the Atlantic’s blue-green waves.

Amélia challenged the designers to

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create three different zones within the studio. She needed a resilient surface for metalwork; a deep sink, a sturdy table, and washable flooring for ceramics; and plenty of light and easel space for painting.

Marrote and his team created a snug but functional space wrapped in wood.

For the eastern entrance facade, the architects layered spaced spruce boards in a vertical pattern atop alveolar polycarbonate, which lets diffused sunlight illuminate Amélia’s painting area. The plastic cladding “allows for both light and privacy and makes the space warm and serene,” Marrote says.

Hygge—the fashionable Scandinavian concept of coziness—inspired the design’s materiality as well as the circular window on the west-facing side of the studio. The opening offers a contemplative, paintinglike view of the surrounding city and sea.

If a space can captivate a person, then Amélia is bewitched. “When I’m here, it’s as if I’ve been transported to a secret place. How can such a beautiful studio not inspire an artist?”

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P R O M OT I O N

An industry expert explains how propane can help when you can’t—or don’t want to— connect to the power grid.

New Possibilities for Energy Independence

TEXT BY

Bryan Cordill, director of residential and commercial business development at the Propane Education & Research Council PRESENTED BY

Propane Energy for Everyone, an Education for Enterprise campaign

The goal of this vacation home designed by Studio Schicketanz in Big Sur was to disturb the natural landscape as little as possible. Its power system includes a propane tank, which is buried in the ground.

BUILD ANYWHERE Propane use is most common on larger, rural lots and on land where the cost of natural gas

infrastructure doesn’t make sense based on the area’s low housing density. These locations also tend to have fragile electrical service, so it gives builders even more incentive to use products that require less electricity. It comes down to reliability—propane adds to your home’s energy independence.

TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR ENERGY USE Using propane on-site is much more efficient than using electricity generated by burning coal or natural gas at a plant miles away. Only about one-third of that energy reaches your home, which means it takes three times as much fuel at the plant to match the same DWELL

PROPANE ENERGY FOR EVERYONE

amount of energy supplied by propane stored at home.

HEAT ON DEMAND In terms of convenience and cost savings, propane furnaces and water-heating systems can outperform electricity. A propane-fueled, tankless system allows you to have hot water on demand without spending money to keep it hot when you don’t need it. The same goes for the air-heating system—you want it to respond quickly when you need it and bring the home to a comfortable temperature.

Read more at dwell.com/propane.

PHOTO: COURTESY STUDIO SCHICKETANZ

Many people use propane to heat patios and fire up outdoor grills. But when the grid and a natural gas connection aren’t viable for your home—say you’ve taken up van life, reside in a remote area, or can’t store enough solar energy—then responsible use of propane can complement your energy mix. Bryan Cordill, director of residential and commercial business development at the Propane Education & Research Council, explains how it works.

C O LOCAL O DWELLINGS January/February 2022

Three homes. Three very different locations.

But these houses all respond to the lives of their residents—and the needs of their neighborhoods.

One turns a practical set of sunshades into a playful presence on its block. Another appears almost unchanged after renovation, its designers having made the most of its hillside views without building up or out or otherwise interrupting its neighbors’ sight lines. And, finally, a set of townhouses brings a little bit of density, a lot of style, and a betterthan-average price point to its city.

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Janelle Zara

Ye Rin Mok

A Promising Outlook The view was incredible—the house not so much—but a Los Angeles couple saw the potential in a hillside fixer-upper.

Los Angeles typeface designer Jeremy Mickel and playwright Joe Waechter renovated an aging Silver Lake home with the help of architecture firm And And And Studio. The renovation takes advantage of the home’s hillside views, which are especially spectacular in the dining area (opposite), where the couple’s French bulldog, Bruno, likes to get some sun.

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The home’s exterior went from beige to dark green, and a new matching fence (above) encloses a patio. In the living area (opposite), Jeremy, left, and Joe relax on a green Muuto sectional. “We never would have chosen it on our own,” says Joe, extending praise to their architects for nudging them to take chances. “Now we can’t imagine any other sofa. It’s perfect.”

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After more than a year of slogging through the competitive Los Angeles housing market, Jeremy Mickel and Joe Waechter had finally given in to the idea of buying a fixer-upper. As first-time homeowners, renovating gave them pause, but their realtor connected them with Annie Ritz and Daniel Rabin, the couple behind architecture firm And And And Studio, who put them at ease. Jeremy, a typeface designer, and Joe, a playwright and screenwriter, felt an instant affinity for the restrained playfulness of the studio’s work. “We loved their style,” says Joe. “Minimalist but not cold, detailed and full of texture, and a sense of fun and color.” In dating parlance, it was a match.

In late 2018, with Ritz and Rabin helping them evaluate homes, the couple closed on a 1938 house that descends from the top of a hillside in the Silver Lake neighborhood. Joe and Jeremy were already living in the area but on an opposite hill; when they saw the listing’s address they had a hunch it would at the very least have

great views—and they were right. “They were incredible,” remembers Joe, “even if they were hidden behind small windows.”

With a vote of confidence from their designers, the couple were determined to make the renovation work. And it really required a lot of work.

The home was sturdy, but its interiors were dark and divided into a maze of impractically small spaces—“You could get lost going room to room,” Joe recalls— with a grab bag of generic design details: wrought-iron railings, white square kitchen tiles, and a McMansion-style turret. “In a certain way,” Rabin says, “the nondescriptness of the house was its best attribute.” Without a particular style to preserve, the designers had no qualms about gutting the interior.

The site’s steep slope came with rigid zoning restrictions on structural upgrades, so to find more space without increasing the home’s footprint, Ritz and Rabin enclosed the two existing balconies and demolished the chimney, which had

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dwellings To break up the otherwise open main level (opposite), the architects added a powder room wrapped in green. Downstairs, the color returns in the primary bathroom (right), where the designers took out carpeting and a glossy black toilet and put in a Zuma tub beneath an &Tradition Flowerpot pendant.

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run through all three floors, taking the interior’s square footage from 1,434 to 2,016. On the top, main level, the interiors were reconfigured to include open living and dining areas that would make it easy to entertain, as well as a sizable kitchen where Jeremy could bake bread or Joe could cook elaborate meals. For the dining area, the designers created a custom cherrywood racetrack table that seats eight, and in the kitchen, they repurposed the turret as a breakfast nook.

Because their clients sought an open plan that wasn’t too open, Ritz and Rabin added a powder room at the center of the main floor that partially walls off the space. (The room’s ceiling is almost entirely a skylight, one of several now installed in the home.) For people walking into the house, the addition hides a big reveal: a new balcony on the front and expansive north- and west-facing windows that capitalize on the vistas that drew the couple to the property in the first place.

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“ We were a good match for Annie and Daniel because we were game for unconventional ideas.

We’d share materials and details we liked, and then they’d show us even more exciting options.”

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Joe and Jeremy initially liked And And And in part because of the firm”s kitchen designs.

“Annie and Daniel had done a kitchen for their own home that we loved,” says Jeremy. “It was beautiful and functional.” For the couple, the studio selected warm wood finishes accompanied by black soapstone counters, Forbo Marmoleum cabinets, and a copper faucet.

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“Annie and Daniel imagined these windows as viewfinders—invitations to witness the spectacular hillsides, the reservoir, and the mountains that surround our home,” says Jeremy. “We watch the sunset over the hills through the dining room window every evening.”

Downstairs are two guest rooms and the primary bedroom, with windows facing multiple directions and an en suite bath. The third and lowest level will be an accessory dwelling unit that will also house Jeremy’s design studio, MCKL. When it came time to discuss finishes and furniture, Jeremy and Joe gathered their thoughts on a Pinterest board.

Jeremy admits that some of their ideas didn’t quite fit together, but Ritz and Rabin pulled out complementary elements, among them light wood grains, bold colors, and an overall minimalist clarity. One of the home’s defining features is a series of modernist-inspired cherrywood modular shelving systems that Rabin and Ritz designed for the main 68

level, where Jeremy and Joe’s collections of books, vinyl, and artwork are on display.

From there, the rest of the finishes fell into place. In the kitchen, Rabin and Ritz kept on theme by using Forbo Marmoleum cabinets in a conifer green, establishing a palette that led to black soapstone countertops and a complementary peach for the walls. The exterior then went from beige to dark green with contrasting white numbers by HEWI for the address.

In reflection, Ritz and Rabin were pleased that their clients both had an eye for design, as well as open minds. “They wanted to be pushed out of their comfort zone,” recalls Ritz. “They were open to color, and that helped a lot in giving character to this space.” The finished house, with its many greens offset by creams, is “full of hues that we never would have considered,” says Jeremy. “Annie and Daniel have an uncanny ability to understand how all these elements synthesize into a greater vision.” And, it’s worth adding, a knack for capturing a view.

With no yard to speak of, And And And still managed to find an impressive amount of usable outdoor space. Off the dining area, a slider opens onto a floating balcony (above). On the other side of the home, the kitchen spills onto the patio (opposite). Loungers from Hay accompany a table from CB2.

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Outside Paris, Blandine Minot and Olivier Stora’s home appears to float above a preexisting wall. The second story is wrapped with louvers, which shade the interior and provide privacy. “We were interested in the idea of a structure secretly staring at the street,” says architect Sihem Lamine of Arba.

At a dancer’s home in suburban Paris, a distinctive facade balances privacy and openness.

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“It was one of my dreams,” says Blandine Minot as she slowly folds her legs into a pretzel. “The drawings that I did when I was seven or eight years old were full of tree houses.” A modern dancer, Blandine has taken a seat on a tatami mat in the mezzanine that presides over her new home. From this perch, with a close-up view of a plum tree outside the house’s large windows, she seems to have gotten her wish.

In fact, a forest metaphor is a great way to describe the home. On a bustling street in the Parisian suburb Fontenaysous-Bois, the 1,428-square-foot structure sits on an infill lot behind a masonry wall that once enclosed a farmhouse. It obscures the home’s ground floor, where private spaces—three bedrooms and a bath—are concealed like the understory

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in the woods. Upstairs, the voluminous second floor contains the home’s more public spaces under a broad gable roof that soars like a tree canopy, with the mezzanine tucked like a bird’s nest under a corner of the roofline.

Jean-Baptiste Barache and Sihem Lamine of architecture firm Arba came up with the design based on the idea of dedans et dehors, a hybrid of indoor and outdoor space that crops up in much of their Paris studio’s work. Blandine and her partner, Olivier Stora, the director of a dance company, bought the land in 2018, and construction ended in the summer of 2020. The ongoing pandemic has made the connection to the outdoors even more important for the couple and their two children, Elie, now age 14, and Nathan, 8.

Blandine calls the open second floor

A large sliding glass door treats the kitchen and dining area to views of the surrounding foliage— including a plum tree that yields fruit for Blandine’s pies. In warm weather, she pulls her dining table onto the balcony to create an alfresco office. A globular Octo pendant

by Secto Design can light the area from above.

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dwellings The living area is outfitted with custom cabinetry by design and fabrication studio Égoïne and a secondhand sofa and coffee table. The mezzanine can be completely closed off with curtains and sliding doors to function as a quiet zone. Blandine spent a long time searching for the right wood stove before discovering the rotatable Stûv 30.

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the home’s grande pièce. The chalet-like space contains a kitchen, a two-desk office, a dining area, and a cozy living area. A robust exposed-timber structure and straightforward, wooden built-in furniture help demarcate the different zones.

The kids enjoy climbing the various ladders—one of which doubles as a bookshelf—down to the ground floor or up to the mezzanine. During the dark days of winter, Blandine uses the smooth parquet floor as a yoga studio. The space is the home’s core and heart.

But the residence’s most striking feature is the crown of windows that wraps three sides of the upper level. A chain of roughly one-and-a-half-foot-wide, sevenfoot-tall larch louvers—lined up like dominoes and seeming to stretch out over the wall to the street—creates a dramatic flipbook effect, both for those passing by

Built-in desks and cabinets by Égoïne create an office nook (above) overlooking the staircase. The bathroom and bedrooms are on the first floor (below), which has lower ceilings and a cozier feel. “The doors are narrower here,” Blandine says,“which makes the rooms seem bigger.”

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Blandine asked Égoïne to create handholds along each bookshelf to allow her boys—and herself—to climb from the ground floor to the second story.

A pull-down ladder leads to the uppermost level, a mezzanine nestled beneath the roof. The pendants above the office are from Zangra.

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such a distinctive structure was not an and for the residents inside. At night, easy task. Because the residence lies near Blandine says, the shutters emit an orange a 14th-century church, the owners glow. “There’s an inner light that’s very needed a thumbs-up from an Architecte beautiful,” she says. “Jean-Baptiste had it des Bâtiments de France, a state official in his head that this would be not only a charged with preserving the country’s house but an artistic object in the city, a little bit like a sculpture.” historical sites. “Even though we can’t see On the lower level, the house is more the church from here, we are within its intimate; windows are restricted to the historical protection perimeter—it’s very narrow doors that lead from each bedFrench,” says Blandine, suppressing a room to the garden. The ceiling is relatively laugh. The design ultimately received the bureaucratic blessing. low, and the floors are heated. The ambiIts sculptural qualities aside, the house ence is subdued, offering a balance to the has given Blandine a sense of security. “My liveliness upstairs. “In the beginning, I work came to a full stop during the panwas saying that I would like to have windows and light everywhere,” says Blandine, demic,” she says. “I couldn’t perform at all.” but Barache encouraged a contrast And her forest fantasy has taken on a between the upper and lower levels. It was Swiss Family Robinson dimension, particua choice the family came to especially larly on the home’s second floor, where the appreciate during last summer’s heat wave. open plan is anchored by a rotatable Obtaining construction approval for woodstove. “I looked for a long time for

While the rest of the home carries a neutral tone, the single bathroom shouts by comparison, with blue and off-white stoneware tiles arranged in a pixelated gradient.

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Blandine stands at the home”s entryway, where the siding is treated with black pine resin. The louvers were placed late in the build. “It was nice before the shutters were installed, but we were completely naked toward the city,” she says. “We wound up losing a little bit of light, but I prefer to be dressed up.”

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In the backyard, a 1,016-gallon cistern stores rainwater for flushing toilets and watering plants—including a vegetable garden and plum, cherry, and fig trees.

The home’s red zinc roof takes its color cue from neighboring buildings.

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a woodstove that I could cook with,” Blandine says. “It reassures me to know that if the world collapsed, I could still keep warm. We have water from a cistern outside and a little garden to grow things.”

She pauses for a moment as she sits in her dining room and then adds, “Maybe I wouldn’t really survive, but I like to imagine that I could.”

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“We always want to feel the carpentry in our projects. Our goal here was to show the wood of the structure as much as possible.”

JEAN-BAPTISTE BARACHE, ARCHITECT

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Developer Ryan Goodman built a complex of six townhouses in Victoria, British Columbia, all priced below the median for the city. The design, by architect D’Arcy Jones, has a striking facade made largely from textured stucco panels.

“During construction, I bet people thought we were building a bridge,” says Goodman with a laugh. Michael Imperial (opposite) and his family were among the first residents when the project finished in 2020.

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A group of townhouses brings a bit of relief to a Canadian city’s overheated housing market.

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Michael sits with his partner, Aiko Lista, and their son, Nathan (left). As in the other units, the finishes in their home are muted. “Honest materials,” Goodman calls them, including the wood that lines the stairway (opposite).The finishes provide a canvas for the homeowners’ lives, says Jones. “Let people’s stuff add the personality.” Artwork hangs in the couple’s dining area (below), home to a Saarinen table and a quartet of Eames chairs.

If Western Canadian cities were a family, Victoria would be drama queen Vancouver’s hippie-granola kid sister: easygoing and low maintenance. For the new class of remote workers emerging out of the pandemic, this coastal city presents the allure of a promised land, where you can get more bang for your buck, maybe even snag a little property, and still have some world-class restaurants just down the street.

But even before the wild real estate ride set off by Covid—with big-city dwellers everywhere seeking space for working remotely and entertaining safely—Vic fell prey to its own allure. A boom of young families flooding in during the last several years jacked up the housing market and exacerbated a lack of midrange, modestly sized starter homes. There were expensive heritage homes aplenty and condo towers galore (perfect for the empty nesters and university students who make up much of the city’s population). But that Goldilocks sweet spot of not too big and not too small became more and more elusive. By early 2021, the median home price was flirting with CAD $1.2 million (USD $940,000) for the first time—and often for a teardown structure or at least a property needing major renovation. The middle, as they say, was missing.

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“ People aren’t looking for the white picket fence anymore. They’re looking for communities where they can raise their families, and they want to live in innovative, creative houses.”

RYAN GOODMAN, DEVELOPER

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Unfinished plywood lines the stairs in one of the units (this page). The driveway (opposite) brings residents together.

“We were hoping there would be people with similar values moving in,” says Michael—and that turned out to be the case.

One neighbor owns a street wear shop; another has talked about starting a board game night. Two other toddlers also live in the complex—built-in buds for Nathan.

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Each of the development’s six townhouses has a terrace off of the kitchen (above) and a roof deck. Michael and Aiko’s neighbor Allie Slemon lounges on top of her unit (right).

The decks are accessed by a hatch at the top of the stairs (left). Jones designed the structure’s angular footprint to fit a handful of homes on the odd, triangular lot—long left undeveloped—in the row-house and single-family neighborhood (below).

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For developer Ryan Goodman, who lives in Victoria himself, it has been frustrating to watch. “We want to build houses that reflect the future we see for Victoria, which is a city built for a young, creative workforce,” he says. But prices were pushing this influx of talent and young families farther and farther away from the heart of the city. Goodman decided to do something about it and began developing homes specifically for that demographic.

Then he came across an awkward, wedge-shaped lot in the Oaklands neighborhood (10 minutes from downtown) with a “For Sale by Owner” sign and saw a huge opportunity. An audacious proposal from architect D’Arcy Jones sealed the deal. “I was just bullshitting because I wanted the job,” Jones says with a wry smile. The Vancouver-based designer had told Goodman he could fit five houses onto the lot—long vacant because of its eccentric geometry—though he wasn’t entirely sure how.

With the help of associate architect Jesse Ratcliffe, Jones would one-up his own BS. The angled, handsomely brutalist building they designed wound up accommodating six three-story, two to threebedroom units ranging from 1,641 to 2,004 square feet and starting at just under CAD $800,000 (USD $625,000). The homes, known as Pearl Block, cascade out from the front of the lot in a stepped form, offering each its own view of the street via a large picture window in its second-story living room as well as from the covered courtyard-like area between the front door and private garage. Stucco facade panels jut past the third-floor bedroom windows and wrap around each unit’s roof deck like horse blinders, offering privacy from neighbors both within the complex and in the single-family homes that abut it.

The units also have sliding doors leading to side balconies bounded by landscaping.

Michael Imperial and Aiko Lista (and baby Nathan) were the second family to

purchase one of the townhouses. It was a long way from home for the young couple: They’d grown up in Ontario and were happily living in an 800-square-foot apartment in Toronto, close to the e-commerce company they both work for. The small quarters and shared laundry were worth it for a vibrant city life—until the pandemic came along. Their favorite restaurants shut down. Their office went digital by default. All signs pointed to a change.

Aiko’s parents had relocated to Canada’s West Coast years earlier. Being closer to family and nature, plus the milder climate, was appealing. Coming across Pearl Block’s modern design and affordable price made the couple commit. “It was a perfect storm,” says Michael. “It just made sense.”

When it came time to design the individual units, Jones took density as a personal challenge, weaving everything one would want from a single-family home into a tight yet airy package. For former condo dwellers like Michael and Aiko, it

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The cantilevered upper floors create a covered courtyard for each unit. Some of the facade”s stucco panels protrude to provide privacy and shade. Many of the principals at Goodman”s company, Aryze, have young children, as does Jones, making the team well suited to design for growing families” needs.

“We don”t find it hard to relate to stuff like this,” says Jones.

feels like a miracle. “We can be in spaces where we don’t see the other person,” says Aiko, with mock disbelief. Weekdays, they alternate use of their shared office by the entryway on the ground floor, switching off taking work calls with walking Nathan to one of the dozens of nearby parks (or neighborhood coffee shops).

In their back unit, the largest of the six but without a garage, a black-paneled stair takes the family from their unique entry level (which holds storage, a roomy laundry area, and their office/guest room) up to the living and kitchen area, and then into the sleeping quarters on the third floor; one more flight leads to a glass hatch, which opens up onto their cedarclad rooftop deck. What’s unusual here is the height of the deck walls: as tall as a fence, intended to block out the neighboring rooftops and make way for mountain views and sky. Michael and Aiko have put up string lights and grown a tomato plant.

Some neighbors have set up hot tubs or fire pit tables.

With all the windows and doors open, air flows effortlessly through, up, and down the levels. “I feel like I’m at the cottage,” says Aiko. It’s a home that’s a breath of fresh air in more ways than one.

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budget breakdown

Double Take Partway through a renovation, an Atlanta artist uncovers the true potential of a dreary home.

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TEXT BY

Muriel Vega PHOTOS BY | @BENJAMINRAS

Benjamin Rasmussen

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budget breakdown

When designer and artist Briana Babani began demolishing the interior of her 1953 brick bungalow in East Atlanta, she didn’t expect to fall in love with it. “It was like a cave,” says Briana, who had moved from Austin, Texas, with her husband, Dominic Cancilla, and their eight-yearold son, Cooper, for Dominic’s work in the film industry. “It didn’t scream ‘dream home,’ but I saw the potential—the lot is incredible. We thought we would keep it as a future rental property.”

The previous owner had smoked inside for decades and neglected the 1,600-squarefoot home, which needed a new roof and had suffered water damage. Briana originally envisioned a basic upgrade, but the project’s scope—and her personal investment—changed as she scrubbed the grime and smoke stains off the large windows.

“There was so much light that came in, and views of the outside, and I wanted to harness that, embrace it,” she says.

Briana decided to turn the neglected building into the kind of home she’d always wanted. She subcontracted the

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electrical, plumbing, HVAC, drywall, roof, and insulation work but took on all the rest herself, which freed up money in the $122,000 budget for choice splurges among more affordable finishes.

Briana tore down walls to better connect the living and dining areas and added wraparound cabinetry in the entry. She combined two existing bedrooms to create a primary suite with a walk-in closet and closed off a doorway to create Cooper’s room. Here, a forest mural sets the scene for his pet geckos and other reptiles. To maximize storage, she added a built-in bed with a trundle below, surrounded by builtin bookshelves.

“I’m a huge fan of built-ins, especially when you’re living in a small space,” says Briana. “They’re in every room in the house.”

Previously too narrow, the expanded galley kitchen sports a vaulted ceiling and Ikea cabinets with bamboo fronts from Semihandmade, one of the spendier choices. This connects to what was previously a back porch, now an office. From

Years of neglect had taken their toll on the 1950s Atlanta bungalow that Briana Babani and Dominic Cancilla bought in 2017. A gut renovation, done largely

by Briana (opposite, with the couple’s son, Cooper), restored original details like the gridded windows (above) while upgrading systems and reimagining the interior. In the living/dining area (below), she removed a header and wing walls to open the space.

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budget breakdown

3 1

2

3

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1. CORK WALL

2. BAMBOO FACING

3. WINDOWS

Briana covered a wall between the primary bathroom and closet in cork wallpaper from Serena and Lily. Though the paper cost $200 a roll, she needed only one, and because the wall is reflected in a mirror, “it was a great bang for the buck,” she says.

Most of the couple’s pricier outlays were for practical things like foam insulation and a top-notch plumber.

But the Semihandmade bamboo cabinet facings in the kitchen were an aesthetic choice. “They were just something I really loved,” says Briana.

The gridded windows were reglazed but otherwise kept intact. “Aside from some crumbling or broken panes, their condition was fine,” says Briana. “The only new windows we could afford would have looked terribly cheap, so it was worth the effort to refurbish them.”

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budget breakdown

BUDGET $1,090 S U RV E Y +

$1,207 PERMITS

DEMOLITION

$9,230 LU M B E R +

$12,450

$9,764

$1,695

$4,645

+

E L E CT R I CA L

H VAC

SIDING

I N S U L AT I O N

$3,672 +

$15,690

$5,863

CA B I N E T RY

APPLIANCES

BLINDS

$17,098

$122,052

L A N D S CA P I N G

TOTA L

$13,817 P LU M B I N G

FIXTURES

$5,186 F LO O R I N G

D O O RS

$5,782

TRIM

$2,573 + S TA I N

D RY WA L L

PA I N T

FRAMING

$6,467 T I L E + S H OW E R

PA N

$2,491* RO O F + GU T T E RS

$1,141 W I N D OWS

$2,191 +

MISC.

The outdoor areas were designed with two perspectives in mind. “Typically people focus on making the house look beautiful from the outside,” says Briana. “Because of all the windows, I wanted to also consider how we experience the outside from the inside.” In the backyard, a fire pit also serves as a grill thanks to grates that slide back and forth on steel rails. “We cook on it all the time,” says Briana. “I think it’s my husband’s favorite part of the house.”

*Insurance paid for most of the new roof, which helped keep costs low.

their built-in desks, the couple can look out at the new deck, a workshop clad in stained pine, and a concrete fire pit shaded by a large oak tree in the backyard, where Cooper loves to play ball.

“I tried to use the landscape and the hardscape to create a series of exterior spaces that are as livable as our interior ones,” says Briana, who transformed the front yard with a two-level deck surrounded by conifers and shrubs. The home’s brick exterior, now stained dark, recedes into the greenery.

“Everything that I see has a touch of my own,” says Briana. “For me, the ultimate goal was for the house to be a vessel for my family’s quirky and eclectic belongings and interests. It shouldn’t feel too precious. This is a house for living in, not looking at.”

4. BUILT-INS

Every room has built-ins Briana designed and made herself. Cooper’s bedroom includes a platform trundle bed, an alcove desk, and lots of shelving. The wood is painted with Dove White

by Benjamin Moore, and the Sektion drawers are from Ikea.

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93

outside

TEXT BY

PHOTOS BY | @REBECCASTUMPF

Joe Eaton

Rebecca Stumpf

Hooked on a Feeling A rambling fishing retreat in Montana cuts through cabin conventions.

In Darby, Montana, just steps from the Bitterroot River, John Shoemaker and Greg Case built a home base for their fly-fishing group vacations.

Designed by Minneapolis firm Lazor/Office, the structure is contemporary but evocative of the past. “We took the classic Montana barn and played around with it to find other geometries within that silhouette,” says firm founder Charlie Lazor.

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PHOTO: DWELL CREATIVE SERVICES

Dwell and Concrete Collaborative drew on our shared California roots to create a multipurpose line of handcrafted encaustic patterned tiles. Inspired by surf culture and classic surfboard shapes, they come in five versatile styles and colors ranging from cool blue to earth tones for endless eye-catching patterns.

Check them out at dwell.com/concretecollaborative.

x

outside

Decks add almost 2,500 square feet to the 3,280-square-foot interior, encouraging outdoor gatherings. A long guardrail (above), made from trees felled to clear the property, doubles as extra seating. Next to the entrance (right) is an area map etched in aluminum by Black Mountain Marking. A Pro-Ject turntable (top) plays a record from John’s vinyl collection.

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John Shoemaker drops the needle on a record, and notes from Miles Davis’s Kind of Blue echo off the rough-sawn Douglas fir walls of his fishing lodge in Montana’s Bitterroot Valley.

It’s a rare moment of quietude for John, the managing partner of a private equity firm in Pennsylvania. For the next week, a cast of friends from the East Coast will stay at the lodge and fly-fish in the nearby Bitterroot and Clark Fork rivers. Built in 2020, the 3,280-square-foot cabin replaces one he and his longtime fishing buddy from Philadelphia, Greg Case, bought more than a decade ago to host such gettogethers. In 2019, they decided to knock down the old building, which harbored mice and bats, for something modern yet rugged, evoking the hard-wearing lodges of the past.

“We wanted a place where you could walk in wearing your fishing waders and smoking a cigar, and could grab a beer from the refrigerator without worrying about anything,” John says.

For the design, John and Greg turned to John’s childhood friend Charlie Lazor, founder of the Minneapolis firm Lazor/ Office, and asked for something that would blend in with the rural surroundings. Starting with the silhouette of a classic Montana barn, Lazor pulled, prodded, and cut away spaces until he was left with a two-part wood, glass, and steel building united by a sprawling system of decks and walkways along with a single, aggressively cantilevered roof.

Lazor’s design is an experiment with geometry and ambiguity. “It presents as

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this

my

is house

Kiki’s house is the foundation for her family’s strength, stability and self-reliance.

To learn more or find the local Habitat serving your community, visit habitat.org.

outside

In the living/dining area (left), rough-sawn wood-plank screens cover a wall of windows.

The removable panels keep the space cool in summer but are taken down the rest of the year so that the sun can heat the interior. The kitchen (far left) features a Northstar retro refrigerator and a smaller fridge from Big Chill. In an upstairs bedroom (below), glass panels offer views of the sky. The sconce is from Schoolhouse Electric, and the blanket is from Pendleton.

N

Silhouette House DESIGNER LOCATION

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N

Lazor/Office Darby, Montana

Deck Entrance Living/Dining Area Kitchen Powder Room Laundry Room Pantry Bunk Room Bathroom Outdoor Shower Breezeway Bedroom Balcony Shuffleboard Loft

J

J L

I

L

I

H

H I

I

M

K G F

D

C

E

N B A

First Floor

Second Floor

“You lie in bed at night and see the sky—it’s like you’re camping.

You don’t really want to go to sleep—you just want to look at the stars.””

GREG CASE, RESIDENT

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16-foot table while taking in views of the Bitterroot River and the Jewel Mountains.

The other volume contains the bedrooms. John’s and Greg’s private secondfloor rooms feature huge skylights for stargazing. On the ground level, two lodge-style rooms with single beds are purposely spartan to steer people to the communal areas. Benches suffice for seating, and guests stow gear in lockers.

Many visitors don’t know one another before they arrive, but the bare-bones design helps foster new relationships.

“It was built as a place to commune and introduce old friends to new friends,” John says as the sounds of Miles’s trumpet echo through the living area. “You can’t do that if someone is alone reading a book.”

ILLUSTRATION: LOHNES+WRIGHT

one thing, and it becomes something very different,” he says. From a distance, the lodge resembles a decaying farm building clad with a patchwork of loose-fitting planks. Inside, planes of wood and glass wrap spaces that feel contemporary but perfectly at home in the woodsy setting.

With minimal personal space, the cabin is meant for connecting with nature and friends. The larger volume holds groundfloor living, kitchen, and dining areas where guests gather before and after fishing. Live-edge wood-plank screens covering the all-glass southern and western walls provide shade in the summer and come off in colder months to let in the sun’s warmth. Wooden stairs lead to a loft where visitors can play shuffleboard on a

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P R O M OT I O N

Undiscovered Stay Dwell held a contest to find the next must-visit listing on Airbnb, and this is it. We can’t wait to go.

“I’ve always envisioned this home being available on Airbnb, where unconventional houses really stand out,” says host Austin Griffith.

“After a long design process in collaboration with my amazing architect, Kimberly Peck, I arrived at this sort of modern watchtower concept,” says owner Austin Griffith of his newly listed Airbnb property, which is nestled in New York’s Catskill Mountains. Having spent his childhood roaming the outdoors in Michigan, he felt an instant connection to southeastern New York’s open spaces when he first visited the region. “I started looking for property in the area around 2015. One of the first dates with my girlfriend was spent hiking at nearby Kaaterskill Falls and looking at vacant land, and I’m sure she thought I was out of my mind,” Austin says with a laugh.

Crazy or not, he bought a parcel that hit all the marks, with just the right acreage and a well already in place.

The layout of the home lends itself well to mingling with family and friends. The bedrooms are on the first two floors, clearing the third floor for shared living spaces that look out on the tempting scenery. “There’s also a roof deck, where you can take in the views or do some stargazing with our telescope,” Austin says. He also incorporated amenities such as heated terrazzo floors and a deep soaking tub in the main bedroom suite. “I love that people say the view from here is like a painting and, most important, that they can’t wait to return.”

PHOTOS: GREGORY FARRELL

Learn more at dwell.com/airbnb.

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Alexandra Rose Another Doorway / 40” x 60” paintings in oil, acrylic, ink on canvas Los Angeles, California Commissions/Collaborations upon request alexandraroseart.com

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Sonoma Forge Designer Faucets and Showers From the WaterBridge Collection, Sonoma Forge offers a floor-mounted Tub-Filler with a Hand-Shower option in a beautifully efficient configuration. The artful interpretation of raw plumbing parts found throughout The WaterBridge Collection is quintessential Sonoma Forge. Choose the Elbow Spout shown here or the split-bamboo Waterfall Spout. Five standard finishes are available: Rustic Nickel (shown), Rustic Copper, Satin Nickel, Oil-Rubbed Bronze, or Matte Black. Matching faucets, amazing exposed showers and bath accessories. Forged in America.

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sourcing The products, furniture, architects, designers, and builders featured in this issue.

24 Grading on a Curve

90 Double Take

Måns Tham Arkitektkontor manstham.com Construction by Esbjörn Wiklund wiklundsbyggtjanst@ gmail.com Structural engineering

by Ehns Projektering mattias@ ehnsprojektering.se Lighting and interior design by Måns Tham Arkitektkontor 24 Exterior walls from Kebony kebony.com; roof from Prefa prefa .com; windows from Velfac velfac.com 25 Dining table and chairs by Kristensen & Kristensen kristensen .com; larch wood walls from UPK Concept urmas@upkconcept.se

Briana Babani brianababani.com 90 Composite decking from Cali Bamboo calibamboo.com 91 Table from Room & Board roomandboard .com; Laika pendant from Blu Dot bludot.com 92 Appliances from KitchenAid kitchenaid .com; countertops and cabinets from Ikea ikea .com; range hood from Zline zlinekitchen.com; bamboo cabinet fronts from Semihandmade semihandmade.com 93 Chairs from Direct Furniture Modern Home directfurnituremh.com; fire pit by Briana Babani; concrete block from Larkin Refractory Solutions larkinrefractory.com; grates from Grate Grates grategrates.com

Manta North mantanorth.com 45 Sofa from Ikea ikea .com; dining table and bed from Mint Furniture mintfurniture.lv; Selene bathtub from Aura aurabaths.com 50 Undivided Intention New Affiliates new-affiliates.us Urban Design Workshop udw-arch.com Construction by Kraftwork kraftworknyc.com Cabinetry design by Studio Kina studiokina.com 50 Custom curtain from Rose Brand rosebrand.com 51 Cloud Softlight by Molo molodesign.com; magazine rack by Chen Chen & Kai Williams cckw.us 52 w151 pendant by Wastberg wastberg.com; Le Bambole sofa by Mario Bellini 54 Coffee table by Faye Toogood t-o-o-g-oo-d.com; armchair by Wentrcek Zebulon wentrcekzebulon.com

A Promising Outlook

94 Hooked on a Feeling 56 High Art Madeiguincho madeiguincho.pt 56 Furniture designed by Madeiguincho 57 Sink from Ikea ikea .com; faucet from Light in the Box lightinthebox .com; light from B.K.Licht bk-licht.eu 60 A Promising Outlook And And And Studio andandand.studio Zorzoli Construction zorzoliconstruction.com Structural engineering

by Craig Phillips Engineering & Design cped.la Interior design by And And And Studio 60 Windows from Fleetwood Windows & Doors fleetwoodusa.com 61 Mori pendant from RBW rbw.com; Prouvé Standard SP chair from Vitra vitra.com; table by And And And Studio 62 House numbers from HEWI hewi.com 63 Sofa by Muuto muuto.com;

Dwell® (ISSN 1530-5309), Volume XXII Issue 1, publishes six double issues annually, by Dwell Life, Inc., 547 Market Street, PMB 35259, San Francisco, CA 94104-5401, USA. Occasional extra issues may also be published. Copyright ©2022. All rights reserved. In the US, Dwell® is a registered trademark of Dwell Life, Inc. Publisher assumes no responsibility for return of unsolicited

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velvet sofa upholstery in Moss from Knoll knoll.com; rug from Armadillo armadillo-co.com 64 Ojai Lounge Chair by Lawson-Fenning lawsonfenning.com; Offset coffee table by Philippe Malouin for Resident resident.co.nz 65 Flowerpot VP1 pendant from &Tradition andtradition.com; faucet and fixtures by Phylrich phylrich.com; Primavera Verde Tile from Mutina mutina.it 66–67 Polished copper faucet from Watermark Designs watermarkdesigns.com; appliances from Fisher & Paykel fisherpaykel.com 68 Shelving hardware by Rakks rakks.com 69 Chairs from Hay us.hay.com; coffee table from CB2 cb2.com; Dimple sconce from RBW rbw.com 70 Off the Wall Arba arba.pro

Structural engineering

by Konstruktif konstruktif.fr Civil engineering by Effilios effilios.fr Carpentry by Tosco +33.6.64.79.27.35 Carpentry by Joly & Co gerald-joly@orange.fr Carpentry by Égoïne egoine.fr 70–71 Roof panels from VMZinc vmzinc.com 72 Pendant by Secto Design sectodesign.fi; chair by Caravane caravane.fr; artwork by Philippe Charles philippecharles.fr 73 Wood stove from Stûv stuv.com 74 Mirror from Leroy Merlin leroymerlin.fr 75 Bookshelf by Égoïne egoine.fr; pendants from Zangra zangra.com 76 Contesa bathtub from Cedeo cedeo.fr; sinks from Roca roca.fr; faucets from Grohe grohe.com 77 Pendant from Zangra zangra.com; wood cladding from Birka DC birkadc.com

manuscripts, art, or other materials. Subscription price for US residents: $27.00 for 6 issues. Canadian subscription rate: $39.95 (GST included) for 6 issues.

All other countries: $49.95 for 6 issues. To order a subscription to Dwell or to inquire about an existing subscription, please write to: Dwell Magazine Customer Service, PO Box 5100, Harlan, IA 51593-0600, or call 777-939-3553.

80 Happily Medium D’Arcy Jones Architects darcyjones.com Structural engineering

by RJC Engineers rjc.ca Civil engineering by Westbrook Consulting wbrook.ca Landscape design by Biophilia Collective biophiliacollective.ca Interior design by D’Arcy Jones Architects Cabinetry design by Coast Cabinets coastcabinets.ca Siding by Chouinard Exterior Wall Systems chouinardews.com Windows from Ply Gem plygem.ca 82–83 Art by Shantell Martin shantellmartin.art; lamp from Artemide artemide.com; pendant from Herman Miller hermanmiller.com; table from Knoll knoll.com 85 Avery pendant from Crate & Barrel crateandbarrel.com 86 Brennfield Wicker Egg Chair from Rona rona.ca

Lazor/Office lazoroffice.com Massey Construction 406.360.2545 Structural engineering

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one last thing I’ve always been really interested in the ways in which women experience the workplace. In the U.S., the workplace is a hostile place to be a parent, especially a mother. As a design historian, I look at how objects shape us, and breast pumps are part of that. They assist lactating people while allowing them to do other things—both a positive and a negative in terms of literally squeezing every last drop of productivity out of them.

I find this 1956 breast pump designed by Swedish engineer Einar Egnell intriguing for several reasons. It’s one of the first—if not the first—to cater to the ergonomics and experiences of lactating people. A

Curator and historian Michelle Millar Fisher is including this 1956 breast pump that she bought on eBay in Designing Motherhood, an exhibition at Philadelphia’s Mütter Museum and Center for Architecture and Design.

The show, a collaboration with historian and fellow curator Amber Winick, is meant to spur conversations about how we design for the experience of reproduction.

lot of the lactation data up until that point had been derived from cows, which just feels wrong. But Egnell not only collaborated closely with a female nurse, Sister Maya Kindberg, in designing this pump, he also interviewed patients in the maternity hospital in Stockholm and asked, “How can I design this better for you?” The pump is rather heavy—22 pounds—but, at the patients’ suggestion, it was made to be portable, which was a huge upgrade.

Design for reproduction has historically been done by men primarily for use by women—and unfortunately that’s still typical.

Egnell brought actual users into the design process.

Design historian Michelle Millar Fisher views a 1956 innovation as a turning point for modern parenthood.

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