Remarkable Home

Here is a home whose location dazzles the mind. Situated on a steeply sloped terrain and surrounded by lush vegetation, this home is both spectacular and secluded. The Belvedere Residence was designed by Gwathmey Siegel& Associates Architects and overlooks the San Francisco Bay, having an unobstructed panoramic perspective all the way to the Golden gate Bridge. The first noticeable unusual feature of the building is its vertical construction, making the views of its upper floors truly remarkable. Here is more on the home’s architecture: “A barrel-vaulted ceiling articulates the living and dining spaces at the topmost level of the main house, and a large deck projects towards the bay to extend the space into the landscape. Other, smaller projections from the house’s main volume towards the bay provide more intimate spaces for dining or leisure, producing a façade which can be read as a hierarchy of varying degrees of enclosure within the tripartite structural scheme. Bedrooms, a study and a two-story play area occupy the intermediate floors, while a gym of the lowest level offers close proximity to an outdoor terrace with lap pool, whose “infinity edge” of water establishes a poetic connection to the bay beyond.” Photos by Mark Schwartz.

Single-Family House

If you read Freshome.com for some time you might be aware that A-cero is a comapany that has lots of projects on our website, and today they sent us another really cool house. In this post A-cero presents one of its first residential projects: a single-family house of 250m2 that tales place in Mera, a coastal village of La Coruña. It is a construction with a simple design based on straight lines and geometrical volumes. These architectural pieces have been created as terraces and corbels in the back façade from where is possible to see the spectaculars views of Atlantic Ocean. Limestone covered the whole building. Furthermore the housing’s façade includes many large windows that give a lot of luminosity and spaciousness sensation. It is a threes-story building (basement, ground and first floor).

Elegant Design, Chuckanut Ridge House

Achieving homes with a minimal environmental impact seems to be the major architecture trend of the last years. For today, we bring you the Chuckanut Ridge House, a building designed by Prentiss Architects in Washington state. The architects respected the wishes of the clients, a large family with a strong East Asian heritage and culture, to develop a sustainable home: “The goal of minimal environmental impact and off the grid living led to, among other things, photovoltaic panels to provide the electrical power for the house and the collection of rain water as the water source“. Many people fear that the addition of solar panels might interact with the architecture design in a negative way. In this particular case, the panels are independent and we consider this to be an original alternative solution. Moreover, the floor to ceiling windows ensure good natural lighting throughout the day and transform some of the rooms (particularly the living and bedroom) into front row seats to the fascinating landscape outdoors. 

A Cool Method to Turn a Sofa Into a Bed

We know you guys are used to seeing out-of-the-ordinary furniture on Freshome and that this sofa may seem a bit “common” at first. But we really like it mostly due to its unusual system that allows it to transform into a bed. While most sofas open in front, “Vento” from Thomas Althaus has a system that can be referred to as modular. The user has flexibility in choosing how to arrange his bed. Moreover, once opened, this sofa can also offer storage space for books, CDs and other small objects. This is possible because of a special support that turns into a “night table” once the couch becomes a bed for two persons. Unlike the common sofas which can only be open all the way or stay compact, with this design an intermediate seating solution is possible (like the one in picture 4 for example). Have you seen this system before?