Explore Innovative Cabinet Handles by 4 Female Creatives

Glass, ceramic, wood, and metal are four elemental materials in product design. For the release of two new kitchen cabinet series, Shaker and Plain, Copenhagen’s Reform tapped four female creatives to each select one of these raw ma­terials to create cabinet handles. For the range, dubbed the Atelier collection, designer Maria Bruun integrated both na­tural and smoked oak into pulls and knobs. In creating her handles, ceramicist Yukari Hotta was drawn to round unglazed forms inspired by rocks gathered on the beach. Glassblower Nina Nørgaard fabricated clear and colored glass knobs in organic shapes. Artist and metal fabricator Alberte Tranberg embraced the idea of doing things “wrong” by letting the 90-degree angles on her tubular bent-brass pulls flatten in on themselves. reformcph.com

Karina Kreth Takes a Cinematic Approach to This Home in Argentina

Argentine architect Karina Kreth took a major detour on her path to her current profession. “When I was at university studying architecture,” she reveals, “I started working as an art director for films”—a job she’d keep for 15 years. That career trajectory informs her multidisciplinary practice, Estudio Karina Kreth, founded in 2009, to this day. “Now, when I work with clients,” she continues, “I talk to them about creating a script and a choreography for their house and the way they want to live.” Kreth’s cinematic approach shines through her latest project, a residence in San Isidro, on the outskirts of Buenos Aires. The restrained yet highly detailed design emphasizes negative space, with sculptural elements and focused moments of color that offer a stage set for life to unfold.

The arrangement of the 8,600-square-foot, two-story home, which opens on both levels to outdoor living spaces and terraces, features airy, uncluttered volumes that highlight the young family’s many artistic, culinary, and social pursuits. “For this client, and for me, too, the new luxury is having the time to stay home and be with friends and loved ones,” Kreth notes. Instead of filling rooms with layers of color, furnishings, and texture, she took a tightly edited, less-is-more approach.

Inside a Home Designed With a Film Director’s Eye

In the living room, for example, a large L-shape sectional sofa frames the fireplace. But where a cocktail table would typically stand there’s empty space instead, so the couple’s two young girls can bring out their drum sets for impromptu concerts and dance parties. In many cases, custom furnishings and casework by Kreth provide visual interest while serving double duty to hide clutter. The kitchen is a case in point: She created a large central island to house the dishwasher and oven, but clad it in light-blue fluted wood to make it a sculptural centerpiece. In the entry, an absence of artwork means the white-steel spiral staircase leading up to the second floor’s three bedrooms becomes the focal point. “All the little things for me are very important, because on the big screen, it’s those little things that create the atmosphere,” the architect notes.

Ultimately, Kreth used her director’s eye to imagine scenes of family life playing out in each space, then conceived rooms around those conjured-up vignettes. It is a concept she often refers to as architectural syncretism, or the practice of amalgamating the residents’ countless experiences and memories. “In cinema you compose everything—the costume design, the setting, the props,” Kreth says. “But I cannot imagine a space without people in it. It’s impossible for me.”

Explore the Home’s Soothing Interiors and Sinuous Forms

flos: pendant fixture (stair), sconce, pendant fixture (dining area), pendant fixture (powder room), sconces (bathroom).
ascolta: custom table (dining area).
fch: chairs.
roll&hill: pendant fixture (kitchen), lamp (living room).
cassina: sofa (living room).
apparatus: sconces (main bedroom).
listone giordano: wall stone (powder room).

dulux: paint.

7 Character-Filled Apartment Buildings That Wow

From East Coast to West, Florida to New York, luxury and affordable apartment buildings evict a cookie-cutter approach for character, eco-consciousness, and copious perks

Walk Through Striking Apartment Buildings Brimming With Style

Asher, Tampa, Florida, Designed by Morris Adjmi Architects

Standout: Massive yet LEED Gold certified, the 22 stories offer 490 rental and furnished extended-stay units in a factory-style tower that nods to the region’s industrial past. Conceived with price-conscious tenants in mind—homes start at 380 square feet—details are anything but budget: American oak, terrazzo, brass, and Venetian plaster mix with artwork by Windy Chien, William LaChance, and Thomas Trum and an amenity deck featuring a 74-foot pool.

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The Astor, New York, Designed by Pembrooke & Ives and Ash Staging

Standout: The Upper West Side property by Clinton and Russell dates to 1901—as do such interior finishes as the entry’s heavily veined marble. To bring the rental-owner hybrid into the 21st century, developer CIM hired Pembrooke & Ives to redesign 25 res­idences as luxe condominiums ranging from studios to five-bedrooms, all with contemporary kitchens, oversize main bathrooms, and marble fireplace mantels, as well as two model units, where, along with the lobby, furniture and artwork have been
curated by Ash Staging

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Launch, Alameda, California, Designed by Vida Design

Standout: The northern city is actually an island that once hosted a naval air station, so the 13,000 square feet of amenity and public spaces—even the noir mail room—in the rental mid-rise boast the streamlined, symmetrical influences of maritime architecture, centered on a palette that evokes the color of the sea by day and night (aka Benjamin Moore & Co.’s Polo Blue and Space Black). Furnishings—the lobby’s custom nautical-hued sofas, the club­room’s leather Blu Dot loveseats—are fittingly aerodynamic and shipshape.

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The Suffolk, New York, Designed by JG Neukomm Architecture

Standout: Just as the Lower East Side is home to myriad cultures, the common areas and unit finishes of this 30-story building are a palimpsest of materials and moods. The area’s historic Guastavino vaults inspired the artisanal-plastered, terrazzo-floored lobby with custom 9-foot pendants, the amenity lounge skews continental with Calacatta Viola risers and Patricia Urquiola seating, while the coworking carrels are pure punk with black-and-white photography and Area Environments wallcovering titled Collected Turbulence.

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South E8, Raleigh, North Carolina, Designed by Lorcan O’Herlihy Architects

Standout: To accommodate the southern city’s explosive growth yet maintain its low-rise scale, the three-story building adds eight rental residences to a lot that previously had one, and does it with drama and environmental awareness: The angular facade shifts from white-painted brick to black standing-seam steel paneling, while interiors boast such passive design strategies as cross ventilation, energy- and water- efficient fixtures, ample daylighting, and outdoor access.

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Wellsmith Apartments, Richmond, Virginia, Designed by Hickok Cole

Standout: With the goal of enriching tenants’ days, replenishing their energy, and improving well-being, the 349-unit new-build rental property features a graphic white-brick and black-aluminum exterior complemented inside by local painter Naomi McCavitt’s 11-by-20-foot botanical mural, plus additional stress-relieving art; such elevated finishes as quartz, chrome, porcelain tile, and polished concrete; and airy communal spaces that open onto pools, courtyards, and greenery for a front-porch experience with urban benefits.

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Allan & Geraldine Rosenberg Residences, Freeport, Long Island, Designed by Studio Libeskind

Standout: The firm’s first affordable-housing project also happens to be for seniors, so all 45 units’ ceramic-tiled bathrooms are accessible. Common areas are too, and they’re dynamic as well: Precast-concrete pavers form a rooftop walking track and an internal courtyard, from which doorways painted bright colors that help orient residents to their floor are visible. It’s all contained in a StoTherm ci Mineral facade punched with geometric apertures.

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A Madrid Show House Prioritizes Well-being for People and Pets

Many of us love our furry friends. But, while we may fill our houses with their toys and accessories, we don’t often design interiors for them. However, for a compact apartment appearing in the annual Casa Décor Madrid show house last spring, Spanish architect Héctor Ruiz Velázquez set a chic precedent. Partnering with Ecoplen, a fellow Spanish company that manufactures smart textiles, the Studio Ruiz Velázquez CEO and senior architect conceived of the home for a family of two species—a human with a cat and a dog, not coincidentally the same pets that Francisco Pérez, CEO of Ecoplen parent company Atenzza Group, has—and planned it with their health, harmony, and nature in mind, harnessing the latest product innovations in naturally hygienic materials.

The project began with the idea of equality. “It’s typical of interior design to categorize between accessory and essential, between decoration and structure,” Ruiz Velázquez begins. “In this case, the main elements cover the needs of both pets and their guardians.” Meaning, in this residence, no space would be off-limits for any occupant. The site for the show-house project was a 290-square-foot, two-level studio in a 1929 neoclassical building, but the components can be disassembled and
reassembled with different configurations inside another envelope.

Inside a Pet-Friendly Apartment in the Casa Décor Madrid Show House

Turning to nature for inspiration, Ruiz Velázquez’s concept grew to the idea of a grove of two trees, their cylindrical trunks sheltering the private spaces and supporting a lofted bedroom in their undulating “canopy” above, wrapped in flexible fabric walls. These hanging partitions create privacy and bathe the studio in a lambent glow, softening the light from strip fixtures recessed into vertical edges of the organically shaped dropped ceiling. “The canopy becomes a wall during the day and, due to its translucent capacity, it becomes a lamp at night, giving light with different intensities,” Ruiz Velázquez explains. The wall textile is Ecoplen, which is not only self-cleaning and stain-resistant but also treated with virus-killing biocides and mineral-based photocat­alyst, a natural antimicrobial activated by sunlight, to actively purify the interior.

“The beauty lies in the forms and materials born from a context of their own environment,” says the architect, for whom natural materials were an essential design choice for a space inspired by trees and living beings. In addition to the canopy, he used Ecoplen fabrics to create soft moveable floor cushions, a pink-hued artwork, and a cat play wall that can be endlessly reconfigured with a grid of dowels and pliable textile shelves. The curving walls, structural cylinders, and kitchen are finished in Ecoclay, a natural clay-based material that is both insulating and sound-absorbing. The ground-level flooring is made of an anti­bacterial ceramic tile that Ruiz Velázquez designed, while the concrete staircase and the loft’s slab floor are covered in micro-cement, a waterproof finish mixed with minerals and resins. “All of this creates a healthy and 360-degree healing environment,” he notes.

A Biophilic Design Accessible to Four-Legged Friends

In line with its nature-based material performance, the apartment is largely earth-toned, with pops of pink, blue, and orange only in the soft furniture and accessories. Though it is filled with daylight, Ruiz Velázquez envisioned the interiors like a cave, mostly because of the thermal properties and color of the clay finishes. Sited in the curved niche between the two trunks, the sinuous stovetop and counter of the kitchen feel particularly like a natural landform. The adjacent bioethanol fireplace adds to this cozy atmosphere on the lower level.

Because of the apartment’s small size and the team’s research into the ideal environment for pet enrichment, “We decided to elevate the private areas, freeing up the main floor,” for play, gathering, cooking, and eating, Ruiz Velázquez continues. The shower, for example, which occupies the taller of the two cylinders, is set two steps up the stairs but has separate fittings for humans and dogs to wash up. Its accompanying sink is a few steps up from that. Though the nestlike loft is meant for relaxation, it’s accessible for all—particularly via the cat scratch-and-climbing pole that runs the vertical height of the residence. Its custom round bed is supported by the other structural trunk, the one that houses the water closet downstairs.

The Space Includes Natural Light and Room to Explore

Maintaining sightlines between all common areas was important for daylighting, safety, and peace of mind, so Studio Ruiz Velázquez formulated strategically placed openings in the trunks and canopy to ensure that “animal and human can always have a visual connection, even from different levels,” the architect adds. Though the built-in activity and exploration nooks, like the pet door added to the toilet room for more curious creatures, can provide stimulation, contact between pets and guardians is the main goal.

“This project in particular has a larger scope than the architecture itself,” Ruiz Velázquez opines. “It’s the purest connection of life on the planet, animals and humans living in the same home where they share not only leadership but also the same level of priority in the functional design.” Atenzza’s Pérez wholeheartedly agrees: He’s currently reinstalling nearly every element of the show house—from the cat play wall to the canopy and cylinder systems—at his apartment in Valencia.

studio ruiz velázquez: almudena de toledo; david jabbour díaz; marta garcia rios.

cement design: cement work.
proyectos y reformas: general contractor

drypets: pet bed (living area).
estufamania: fireplace.
geberit: toilet (water closet).
bang & olufsen: speaker (bedroom).

ecoplen: textiles.
cerámica saloni: floor tile.
ecoclay: walls.
axor: sink fittings, shower fittings.
zara home: accessories.

Inside a Flatiron Loft That Doubles as a Spalike Retreat

Rarely does an architect get to renovate the same property three times—let alone within a decade. But the owner of a loft in Manhattan’s Flatiron District, an art dealer, kept coming back to Messana O’Rorke. After the firm designed his original 800-square-foot apartment, the client purchased the studio next door; partners Brian Messana and Toby O’Rorke combined them to create a 1,200-square-foot unit. Later, they returned to install a new kitchen and flooring. Throughout the process, the loft retained a warm, minimal aesthetic and oak-and-brass palette. “We expanded and altered it while keeping the same spirit,” Messana notes.

Located in a former factory building, the expanded apartment has an 11-foot ceiling and seven south-facing windows. The challenge, Messana says, “was how to keep the essence of a loft, that big open space, without creating a studio.” The solution lay in sliding frosted-glass doors trimmed in unlacquered brass that separate the bedroom suite and a snug den from the living and dining area, but allow light to flood through.

The first iteration of the apartment had a galley kitchen that the client rarely used, but over the years, he began to cook more and wanted to entertain. Messana O’Rorke opened the kitchen to the great room, removing the partition wall and installing a basaltina stone countertop with a fridge and freezer hidden underneath. Cabinets clad in French oak match new 9-inch-wide floorboards that replaced fumed-oak flooring to further lighten the space.

For all their appeal, lofts can lack an element of surprise: You walk in the door and see a huge space in its entirety. “The problem is you only have one experience—it’s one-note,” Messana says. He and O’Rorke laid out the apartment so it reveals itself gradually, creating a sequence of events. At the entrance, visitors encounter an intimate foyer with a shoe closet, then turn into a storage-lined hallway and glimpse the front windows. But it’s only farther down, when they arrive at the kitchen, that they can start to appreciate the full size of the loft—and it takes further exploration still to discover the more tucked-away den and bedroom.

There’s one last surprise. “Nobody expects the main bathroom—it’s insane,” Messana says. A masculine, spalike retreat, it’s covered almost entirely in exuberant travertine, including a sexy shower stall with an illuminated tinted mirror. An encore indeed.

Walk Through the Manhattan Loft Apartment

fair: stools (kitchen).
dwr: sofa (living area).
armadillo: rug.
the citizenry: ottoman.
water­works: fittings (bathroom).
uc group: custom bed (bedroom), custom glass panels, custom sliders (bedroom, living area), medicine cabinet (bathroom), shelves (closet).
juniper: lamp (bedroom).
west nyc home: sofa (den).

the hudson company: wood flooring.
lv stone source: stone supplier.
zerolux lighting design: lighting consultant.
m.a. rubiano: mep.
wood floors & surfaces: woodwork.
abs renovations: general contractor.

Ralph Pucci Unveils a Whimsical Collection by Elizabeth Garouste

Almost a decade since her first show with Ralph Pucci International, Elizabeth Garouste returns with a seven-piece collection, Beans. The Parisian designer mined disparate influences, from the Middle Ages to neoclassicism, to create the whimsical biomorphic forms, which include a mirror (Herman), console (Jim), chandelier (Priscilla), side table (Ara), and more. All are handmade of Pucci’s proprietary Plasterglass resin-plaster composite and fabricated by master sculptors working as artists-in-residence at the celebrated gallery’s New York studio. Mosaic tiles and bold colors like deep red and pale grassy green adorn the free-flowing shapes, amplifying their effervescent charm. It’s a more than worthy continuation of her witty and unconventional work as one half of the noted duo Garouste & Bonetti, which flourished in the 1980’s and ’90’s. Through Ralph Pucci International. ralphpucci.com

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“The Plasterglass collections by other designers are generally realized in black or white, but I wanted mine to play with colors and even introduce a new material: mosaic,” says Garouste.

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Yabu Pushelberg Designs a Surrealist Rug Collection for CC-Tapis

Architectural and surrealist motifs distinguish Memento, a new rug collection by Yabu Pushelberg. Launched at a packed opening in the New York showroom of Italian brand CC-Tapis, the Tibetan wool rugs are knotted and carved by hand in a combination of dyed and undyed fibers. The seven designs, including Axo, Drift, and Echo, are memory dreamscapes. Their conception allowed Interior Design Hall of Fame members George Yabu and Glenn Pushelberg, partners in business and life, to quietly reminisce on their shared history—creating mementos that can live on a floor or wall. Elusive and allusive, the references may be known only to the designers—but they’re beautiful to all. cc-tapis.com

Marimekko Unveils an Artful Collection of Tableware and Textiles

Sabine Finkenauer, a German artist based in Barcelona, Spain, initially specialized in sculpture. But her more recent oil pastels on paper have crystallized a hand-drawn vocabulary of everyday shapes inspired by ornament and geometry. Now, Finnish design house Marimekko releases a 16-piece collection of ceramic table­ware and textiles featuring original work Finkenauer created solely for the Artist Series. Among the patterns are checkered Atalaya, Sambara, and Almena, all inspired by carved wooden chess pieces the designer came across at Madrid’s El Rastro flea market, and Tomina, which repeats an angular hourglass shape that crops up time and again across the her oeuvre. marimekko.com

British Paint Brand, Little Greene, Makes Its U.S. Debut

British paint maker Little Greene, owned by the Mottershead family and manufactured in the foothills of Snowdon in North Wales, is well regarded across the pond—up there with the Farrow & Balls and Edward Bulmers of the world. Now, the brand makes its U.S. debut with a store in Greenwich, Connecticut, and a localized e-commerce website. The 196 colors in the brand palette are catalogued by historic period and contain 40 percent more pigment than typical paints—a combination of all-natural and safe synthetic ones. We’re partial to Atomic Red, a super-saturated mid-century red-orange, and Pleat, a shade that lives in the liminal space between green, blue, and gray. Craftspeople rather than machines do the mixing, and there are interior and exterior finishes plus oil- and water-based paints to choose from—not to mention handcrafted decorative wallpapers aplenty. littlegreene.us

Discover Eye-catching Kitchen Hardware Inspired by Fine Jewelry

In 1893, three enterprising brothers founded the Keeler Brass Company, which became known for crafting furniture trim as well as brass parts for the legendary Model T car. More than a century later, the legacy continues, as the domestically manufactured brand relaunches with new hardware—and a partnership with appliance company Monogram. The Monogram Designer Collection, by creative director Richard T. Anuszkiewicz, offers handles, hoods, and refrigerator panels in solid brass or titanium inspired by fine jewelry and watches, some wrapped in hand-stitched Edelman leather. “The proportions and scale are tailored and refined,” Anuszkiewicz notes, “so the user has a tactile experience that engages the senses.” monogram.com; keelerbrasscompany.com Sample Monogram x Keeler Brass Company now on Materialbank.com.

Explore the Monogram Designer Collection