House in Oporto
PT Oporto Rue Morgado Mateus 123
109 m2

When I think of the origins of our great interest in plan making, I recall visiting the home of some friends, Jorge and Teresa, in Oporto back in 1996.

From a first-floor landing, one enters a hall in the shape of an offset hexagon. Rooms led off this space and their glazed doors are so positioned as to allow, when left casually open, views across the entire apartment. 

The bathroom, bedroom and kitchen have doors at both ends, which means that you can walk through these rooms and join a gallery. With single-glazed, outward opening window casements, this space links the apartment with the central light well of the apartment building. 

In the gallery washing may be hung up to dry and, on winter nights, with the windows closed, the space acts as an insulating buffer zone to the quiet sleeping spaces beyond. 

The central hall is big enough for a table to be placed at the centre, or for the children to play and make things on the floor.

It has always interested me the way a plan might originate from the centre and spin outwards linking rooms and spaces – the ‘more than 4 sides’ aspect of a room allows for a rich interior landscape.

Stephen Bates

Miremont le Crêt
Marc Saugey
CH Genéve 1959
65 m2

Wie ein Sägezahnblatt rattert das Immeuble Miremont-le-Crêt der Strassenflucht entlang. Gebaut als Stützen-Platten-Konstruktion aus Eisenbeton, Faserzement, Aluminium, Stahl und Drahtglas ist es eine Ode an Leichtigkeit, Transparenz und die Innovationslust der Nachkriegszeit. Gewiss keine Wohnzeile für das Existenzminimum, so ist das grossbürgerliche Haus doch typisch modernistisch, sprich nutzungsoptimiert und –determiniert. Fast all das muss man im Angesicht der Klimakrise hinterfragen. 

Doch welche Raffinesse im Grundriss: Das zur Fassadenflucht um 30 oder 60 Grad verdrehte Raumraster schafft verschiedene Blickrichtungen und bringt Licht in den tiefen Baukörper. Jede der grundsätzlich einseitig orientierten Wohnungen gewinnt dadurch an Reichtum und umschlingt eine dreieckige Loggia. Die Qualität der 2.5-Zimmer-Wohnung ist unerreicht. Kleiderschrank und Bad schmiegen sich in die Gebäudetiefe. Die Küche wickelt sich um den Balkon. Vor dem Schlafzimmer ist dieser schmaler, vor dem Wohnzimmer mit ausgestülpter Sofaecke breiter. Beide liegen längs zur Fassade, was beinahe unverschämt grosszügig ist.

Palle Petersen

Cottage La Trobe
Manning London
AU Jolimont Melbourne 1839
104 m2

This house is timber, built by Manning of London. Crafted there and sent to the colonies. This one arrived in Melbourne and was raised in 1839. 

Panels arrived, each measuring 1.2 meters in width, fashioned like an old door, with rails, stiles, and insets. They were fitted to square posts, rebated to receive them. The assembly formed a structural order that is subtle but persistent. The doors, nearly identical to the panels, blend seamlessly with the walls, lending each room a sense of independence. And in a certain way, the feeling of being surrounded by a facade, as if outside on the street.

Each room has a distinct size and proportion. The large room is a thick rectangle while another smaller room is connected by a hall that cuts through the house, broad enough for a chair. There are no doors to the small service rooms they open onto the hall like alleys spilling onto a grand street.

The kitchen and bathroom are in separate structures. Without them, the plan has a quiet simplicity, where attention can be placed on the relationship of room to room and imagining how I might live there.

Andrew Power

Haus Bergstrasse
Flora Steiger-Crawford & Rudolf Steiger
CH Zürich 1959
175 m2

I know many beautiful floor plans, but there are only a few that leave a lasting impression even after visiting them. The layout of the distinctive Haus Steiger-Crawford did exactly that. This Swiss-modernist house from the 1950s was the personal home of Rudolf Steiger and Flora Steiger-Crawford. Together, they designed a building featuring two elevated apartments stacked on top of each other, characterized by a simple, centrally organized layout.

When I visited the house a few years ago, the fact that Flora was the first female architect to graduate from ETH Zurich no longer felt like a minor detail. Complementing the methodical modernist idiom, the floor plan reveals deeply considered ideas about how life would actually be lived here.

From the shared staircase, you enter a central, octagonal living area, with all other rooms arranged around it without the need for corridors. The bathroom, kitchen, and storage space are discreetly tucked into the flanks, while the true living spaces are generously proportioned, capitalising on magnificent views through large windows.

The floor plan radiates reciprocity. In this house, you live together—with one another, and with the architecture. Thanks to the elevated position of the home, the large facade openings, and a surrounding, cantilevered balcony, residents can also connect generously with the surrounding Doldertal.

Ninke Happel

Rue Raynouard
Auguste Perret
FR Paris 1929
155 m2

Most appealing in this apartment is the idea of living amidst the city, yet simultaneously being elevated above. This narrow plot acts as shim, creating a characteristic proportioned mass which is triangular, high and slender. Besides, providing a constant connection between the interior to the exterior.

And, this particular apartment on top, which has the sun fully turning around, illuminates all rooms throughout the day. One is able to enjoy every subtle change, in the rays of light entering. Such as a cloud which passes by. Both lighter and darker days will be influencing the atmosphere of habitation. Almost as if living outside, so close to the elements.

Simultaneously, the wooden paneling provides a domestic, warm and protective character. With an ensuite-ordering of the apartment, without indicating a corridor, a long enfilade is connecting all rooms together. With a beautiful transversal room, connecting to both sides of the building - on the sharpest edge. Emphasized by a means of large, light circular ceiling.

I can see myself walking in circles through the apartment, up there. Perhaps I was not even surprised, when I found out later that the building was designed by Auguste Perret himself, and that this was his own house.

Job Floris

Schützenmattstrasse
Herzog & De Meuron
CH Basel 1992
110 m2

The city, the street, the water, a tree—this house is shaped as much by its surroundings as by its inhabitants. On the ground floor, the façade opens in three directions: a recessed red door down a narrow corridor to the left; a storefront anchoring the right; and in the middle, a subtle threshold that draws you in. A black door gives way to a compact entry. A white door opens into a quiet interior. The first step on a wooden floor. Movement is intuitive: two rooms open to the façade, a walk-in closet buffers the bathroom, and a small toilette tucks discreetly beside the entry. Operating as an independent apartment—a private world within. 

Then the scale shifts again. A wide, corridor-like door opens onto light and volume: the communal space. Three interconnected rooms orbit a central void—flexible, open, and defined by your living. Full-height sliding windows, wooden roller shutters, and slender French balconies form a daily life, intuitively guiding openness, privacy, and climate.

At the center, the void remembers the former crown of a tree—now reimagined as the social space of the building. In winter, the lights connect you; in summer, windows and doors open to the shared courtyard, dissolving boundaries between interior and exterior, self and neighbor, courtyard and city. 

The house itself is in motion. Around the courtyard, it unfolds in two directions—never static, shifting as it rises. You pass the courtyard windows further to the back, a large sliding wall reveals the kitchen and invites a large kitchen table. Behind a big cupboard lies a hidden door—another threshold—this time opening to a red brick wall outside. A stair passes by your neighbors doors, offering pauses, balconies, and connections between the inhabitants' lives. 

Descending, the red door guides you back through the corridor, returning you to the city, the street. You haven’t truly left—or perhaps you never stopped arriving.

Chrissie Muhr

House in Lidingö
Jakob Gate
SWE Stockholm 1909
226 m2

When I grew up, my best friend's father was a famous Swedish artist. The family lived in a large Arts and Crafts villa on Lidingö, just outside Stockholm. When I think of a good house to live in, this labyrinth-like home comes to mind.

On the entrance level, there were three connected rooms that my friend's artist father used as his studio. The large, square-shaped corner room had two bay windows. Next to it was a rectangular additional studio space, with a large south-facing window.

In the middle of the house, without much daylight, was a hall with a generous staircase leading up. In the corner stood a fireplace. Directly beside the entrance door was a narrow, steep staircase leading up two floors to the attic. This stairway was added during the Second World War when the attic was rented out as a separate apartment.

The kitchen was at the back of the house, facing north. It had a separate entrance, a small dining room, and storage space next to it.

This old house had a very special mix of work and living spaces. Some areas were surprisingly small and narrow, while others were open and generous.

Mikael Bergquist

Casa di Vidro
Lina Bo Bardi
BRA São Paulo 1951
410 m2

This space is a landscape, no walls, but corners, columns, niches and furniture loosely scattered. With no fixed borders to dictate placement, objects seem to define their own positions, each becoming a character in the story.

Suspended at the level of the tree crowns, the space seems to hover above the sloping terrain. Only the thinnest grid of window frames separate it from the outside, reviving the child-like dream of living in a tree house.

A center patio encloses a tree, which inhabits the landscape’s core. When inhabiting the landscape, one always walks past it. Will it one day grow beyond the house, leaving only its stem behind?

Looking past the patio, into the opposite room, one observes its own space, in a disconnected way, as if it’s the neighbouring space. 

This is where an urban moment unfolds in miniature.

Géraldine Recker

Melnikov House
Konstantin Melnikov
RU Moscow 1929
208 m2

The intersecting cylinders that form the silhouette of an 8-shaped floor plan over three levels display a bold conceptual approach. Its circular outline, defined by thick brick walls and hexagonal windows, has a pure geometric logic, while the interior offers surprisingly exciting spatial quality.

I like the flow of the design, which emphasises the spatial experience of the curvature as given formalism, without becoming too rational. On the ground floor, carefully placed partitions create a functional layout, dividing the space into a hallway, living room, kitchen and bathroom. The upper floor, a place dedicated to art and contemplation, is more minimalist, with just two symmetrically placed walls separating the private areas: the bedroom and a studio with high ceilings that invite an overflow of natural light. In the bedroom, three sculptural pedestals serve as beds, embodying Melnikov’s unique artistic sensibility.

For me, this house strikes a balance between personal artistic expression and functionality. It embodies clarity with interior fluidity, a house with character that feels eccentric yet thoughtful.

Marcel Moonen

Tuscolano
Adalberto Libera
ITA Rome 1954
79 m2

Rome is a city I am not so fond of, basically for the audacity of its urban gestures. So it could be that the contrast within the context which this community offers is part of why I am so attracted to it. These houses offer the zero degree which I require to live, now having a Japanese partner for many years – a situation with a high level of privacy from the outside world. The arrangement of masses here however still guarantees unobstructed views to trees in the garden and then to the sky beyond. A courtyard typology such as this essentially throws the textile curtains out into the landscape, transforming them into walls of bricks (intelligent here in that they also often serve to support the roof of your neighbour's house). The effect of this extended space between layers – on human lives lived – is immense.

Each cluster of four units is not orthodox in plan, in that there is an exception in the arrangement of the courts – due to the orientation of the sun. Without making a fuss, it acknowledges that humans are not the central point of reference within the cosmos. Moreover, that one courtyard that shifts over creates another social type – it is slightly more open to passersby than the other three units, thereby providing appropriate housing opportunities for a gradient of character types within one organic system. Always a good start for healthy urbanism.

Logan Amont

Apartement Temoin
Auguste Perret
FRA Le Havre 1947
100 m2

There is much to love about the Témoin apartment in Le Havre.

There is the care with which built-in closets have been placed, subtly defining the rooms and their transitions. Or the central living space, oriented towards two floor-to-ceiling French windows, offering a rare moment of symmetry in the dynamic floor plan. I also love the ability to take multiple routes through the house. It makes the apartment feel much larger than it actually is.

And notice how the boundaries between spaces are often diffuse, provoking the creation of new connections. For example, the kitchen and study can be linked by opening two folding doors, creating a mini-enfilade along the facade — almost a space in itself. When the two doors of the central (bed)room are opened, the living space flows into the light of the opposite facade, passing through what previously seemed like a simple corridor.

But what I love most is that masterfully placed column that greets you upon entry.

With its octagonal shape and surfaces of tactile bush-hammered concrete, it powerfully suggests — aided by a suspended ceiling — what is not actually there: the corner of the central living space, a corridor leading toward the bathroom, and a subtle delineation of the entrance hall. No walls could have done this more beautifully.

Yet a glance at the structure of the building as a whole reveals that appearances are deceiving. The column wasn't cleverly integrated to fit the design — it simply follows the 6.24-meter grid that structures all of Le Havre's post-war reconstruction.

Perret has so carefully folded the rich floor plan around that single column that it feels like it has always belonged there — as the obvious centrepiece of the home.

Martijn van Sluijters

Hansaviertel
Alvar Aalto
GER Berlin 1957
86 m2

I have spend a few days in a Berlin apartment designed by Alvar Aalto. Temporary accommodation courtesy of a hospitable friend. It’s an uncluttered apartment in a large block that contains units of various sizes, probably originally intended for smaller families. Aalto, an architecture hero from the 1950s, designed the perfect place for a resident who today travels a lot and uses the apartment as a home base and film studio, a lifestyle that Aalto no doubt didn’t envisage at the time. It’s also a perfect place for the various neighbours: young families, singles, couples, seniors, young people.

What exactly makes it so pleasant here? The care given to ordinary things: the entrance to the building feels naturally inviting, for visitors with or without luggage or bikes. At the apartment you enter a spacious hall, with passageways leading to both the kitchen and the versatile living space, described at the time as an “Allraum”. A spacious loggia – perfectly positioned between dining area, sleeping area and living area (now workspace) – feels like the centre of the house and draws light deep inside. That creates a careful yet unforced differentiation between activities such as cooking, dining, relaxing and working. Diagonal views and sight lines and transparent partitions make the space feel larger than it actually is and ensure connections between all interior spaces and the surrounding landscape. The windows around the loggia capture the changing sunlight, creating variety and life. The effect is enhanced by the distinctive open corners that articulate the whole building inside and outside. Simple planks fixed on top of the radiators form heated benches. 

It is his generosity, his focus on how space is used and the attention he gives to daily movement patterns and needs that have sustained the life in these apartments for so long, far longer than in comparable apartments created with less skill and attention. Genuinely good architects have the power to spin ordinary things into gold; to elevate everyday places into valuable living environments; to truly achieve sustainability.

Mechthild Stuhlmacher

Casa Ugalde
José Coderch
ESP Barcelona 1951
257 m2

I have often returned to study José Antonio Coderch’s floor plans; Casa Ugalde remains especially compelling. Twenty years ago, Spanish friends gave me a book on his work. That book has become a constant companion.

The plan is perhaps as difficult to fathom as nature itself. The house is carefully fitted into the landscape, almost as if designed and built on the spot. It seems fused with the terrain, like a fossil embedded in the earth. Its subtle integration anticipates the attention to context that Siza would later bring to his Tea House.

On arrival, a low wall takes you by the hand and leads you along a rock, under the building, to a view of the sea. The house unfolds like a continuous shell, where interior and exterior merge seamlessly. Rooms connect like a cave system: at times you descend into the earth, at other moments you are flooded with light and open vistas.

Curved and angled walls frame outdoor spaces while sheltering an intimate interior. They guide routes from enclosed spaces to open ones. Like in a cave, the function of each room is undefined: a bed makes a bedroom, a table a dining room. 

Everything is executed in white walls and red floor tiles.

Pieter Bedaux

Julia
Hans Scharoun
GER Stuttgart 1954
60 m2

Wir haben es Markus Peter und Ulrike Tillmann zu verdanken, dass die Grundrisse der als Eigentumswohnungen konzipierten Wohnhäuser Romeo und Julia von Hans Scharoun unsere Architekturbibliotheken und Arbeitstische erreichten - und zumindest mein Gehirn mit Freude und Anregung überfluteten.

Wie in diesem Grundriss eine ganze Lebenswelt entsteht! Ich sehe das schwarzweisse Werbefoto zum Familienidyll der 50er Jahre: Die zum Herbstmorgen offenen Fenster, eine Frau mit Schürze, die die Betten macht, Frühstückgeschirr und Spielzeug wegräumt, der Blume in der Vase frisches Wasser gibt? Ich höre das Geschrei der Kinder, die sich um das Möbel von Küche und Bad jagen? Ich weiss, wo sich die Schuhe stapeln und die Zuckerdose steht und wo das Tablar Platz findet für die Schulsachen. Ich sehe die Nachbarin vor der Türe stehen und um ein Ei bitten.

Wie gegenteilig zu unserer eigenen Suche nach ruhiger Neutralität der Räume, die in erster Linie einen schönen Rahmen bilden soll für die Gestaltung der eigenen Lebenswelt.

Aber wie inspirierend im Hinblick auf die wieder aktuell gewordene Verpflichtung, mit wenigen Quadratmetern Raum für viele Menschen zu schaffen. In diesem Falle hier nicht mal 60 m2 für fünf Personen. 

Die räumliche und atmosphärische Dichte der Wohnung und die menschenfreundliche Fantasie des Entwerfers sind bewegend.

Sabina Hubacher

Rue Vavin
Unbekannt / Umbau: Illinca Manaila
FRA Paris 1890 / 2025
29 m2

In einem stillen Quartier des 6. Arrondissements liegt diese kleine Wohnung. Eine eng gewendelte Treppe führt hinauf ins fünfte Obergeschoss, wo sich hinter einer unscheinbaren Tür ein überraschend stimmiger Mikrokosmos öffnet.

Der Grundriss ist schlicht: Ein kleines Entrée verbindet zwei Zimmer und eine Küche, die in der Fläche kaum Platz beansprucht. Im Schnitt offenbart sich Grosszügigkeit – beinahe vier Meter Raumhöhe und ein Oblicht, das den Küchenraum mit weichem Zenitallicht durchflutet. Vom Wohnzimmer aus blickt man durch ein Fenster mit tiefer Brüstung auf ein kleines Plätzchen hinunter, ein Kamin und ein massgefertigtes Regal verleihen dem Raum Charakter. Ein begehbarer Schrank dient als Reduit. Das Schlafzimmer wendet sich einem engen, von Fassaden umschlossenen Hof zu, eine halbkreisförmige Nische ist schmuckes Regal. Angrenzend liegen Toilette und Dusche, die durch ein Fenster in mildes Tageslicht getaucht werden.

Das Erstaunliche: Dieses fein abgestimmte räumliche Gefüge spielt sich auf nur 29 Quadratmetern ab. Nichts wirkt gedrängt, nichts ist überflüssig – jeder Winkel ist bedacht, jede Fläche erfüllt ihren Zweck.

Ein solches Mass an räumlicher Suffizienz lässt sich unter heutigen Normen kaum mehr realisieren. Vorschriften zu Inklusion, Nachhaltigkeit und Sicherheit sind zweifellos berechtigt, doch das Beispiel an der Rue Vavin zeigt, dass manchmal ein anderer Schwerpunkt lohnend sein kann: ein Grundriss, der nicht aus Regelwerken geboren wird, sondern aus dem Wunsch heraus, mit wenig Raum ein dichtes Wohnen zu ermöglichen.

Marc Loeliger

Casa per Tre Famiglie
Roberto Bianconi
CH Bellinzona 1970
103 m2

I’ve never seen the inside of Roberto Bianconi’s house with three apartments in Bellinzona. I’ve only passed by – at first by chance, driving past it, then with growing intent. At first glance, it didn’t seem to belong: too contemporary, too deliberate, too distinct from its surroundings. And yet, I was immediately drawn to it. I couldn’t place it in time – was it old? New? Something in its stance recalled the Tendenza, but with a certain lightness of its own.

Later, I studied the floor plan and returned to the site, this time holding the drawing on my phone. Suddenly it became clear: this building doesn’t seek contact with its built surroundings – it responds instead to air, light, landscape. It defines context in a way that recalls early 1970s thinking: not as architectural fabric, but as natural conditions.

The plan fascinates me: compact, yet generous. It establishes clear separations while allowing for circulation; a strong axis opens to the south; the structure detaches itself from the interior layout. There’s luxury not in size, but in the placement of openings.

It’s striking how a notion of context so different from mine today still resonates when it comes to spaces of living. This house remains a valuable reference to me when building on an open site – something I find far more challenging than working within existing structures. It’s an architecture of attitude, not excess.

Rina Rolli

Earth House
Kazuo Shinohara
JP Tokyo 1966
70 m2

We are drawn to plans that refuse to reveal everything at once. Some hide too much, others show too much, yet in both cases they resist immediate understanding. They force us to imagine what remains outside the drawing. A plan can preserve something precisely by keeping it hidden.

In this plan, Shinohara seems to expose and conceal at the same time, paradoxically. The upper room appears clear and almost primitive. One can feel the earth beneath bare feet, while the light structure allows daylight to fill the space. Yet, in one corner, where the two sloping roofs descend, a long stair cuts through the crust of the earth.

What is hidden below leaves a deep mark on the plan, almost like a crevice. Its depth suggests that the underground room is not simply an addition beneath the house, but a presence that unsettles the space above.

Descending, one enters another realm. The black walls and the singular light source make it difficult to orient oneself; sleeping or studying there seems to begin a second descent, inward, into the self. The buried space remains partly unreadable, quietly affecting the clarity of the room above.

Roberta Frumuşelu + Eduard Untaru

Saas Raat Patio House
Studio Mumbai
IN Mumbai 2016
210 m2

I could not imagine living in Mumbai. Its culture is intriguing, yet at the same time largely unfamiliar to me. For this reason, the Saat Rasta courtyard houses fascinate me on a conceptual level. They go far beyond the idea of a house with windows placed within a landscape. Instead, they are about finding a sense of safety within a tremendously hectic urban environment. At the same time, the dwelling UNIT 4 offers spaces that are extraordinarily beautiful and cannot be easily categorized within Western traditions.

The central open courtyard connects the adjacent rooms. At times, the rooms open directly onto the courtyard; at other times, they are separated by a façade. There is no need for corridors. Circulation is enabled by crossing the courtyard or moving along its façades, following the light. In this simple floor plan, connections are short, making orientation intuitive.

The richness of space and light is emphasized through the use of different materials in each dwelling. This creates a patchwork-like collage of materials both on the level of the complex as a whole and on the level of the individual house. Its fabric—including the presence of greenery—does not resemble a static, deliberately designed structure. Instead, it appears to have grown over time through use and adaptation. The result is a living environment that feels strongly individualized, shaped by its inhabitants rather than imposed by an architect.

Sander Lückers

Domus Demain
Yves Lion + François Leclercq
FR 1984
77 m2

Starting from an understanding of domestic space that knows a wide variety of levels of privacy —subtle thresholds between where we are entirely by ourselves, with our closest circle, with guests, fully exposed — Domus Demain turns the active elements to the fringes of the plan. Today, the façade of most residential buildings is a technical skin, shaped by internal and external requirements and conflicts. We want to be able to look out without being seen in, to enjoy sunlight without excessive heat, and to be expressive without being structurally excessive. The inversion proposed by Lyon and Leclercq elegantly undermines all forms of one-dimensional relationships, leading to a richer, denser understanding of domestic life. Activities such as cooking, writing and washing hands are understood as concentrated moments of individuality, as well as cultural acts of communication. The active façade embraces difference and contradictions and becomes a device, a filter that can be dynamically appropriated. In contrast, the inside of the apartment is structured by objects with great precision and clarity. A functional block divides the main space into four open zones, while the bedroom walls are made of passable furniture to established some distance.

Stefan Wülser

Ungarbuhlstrasse
Refurbishment: Studio Märkli
CH Schaffhausen 2011
65 m2

For now, I’d like to live somewhere simple and mostly ordinary. Unremarkable in appearance but atypically well considered in its planning. 

Sometimes all this requires is some basic judgements and minor actions - from the architect and occupant alike.

To have a larger bathroom and kitchen in a smaller apartment, and a squarish entry hall like a small room of its own –not a corridor– to lead you to the other rooms is enough for me.

Most of it was already there, it just needed some additional thought, a little more area, but barely any more room(s) just another 5m².

Colby Vexler