A row house blessed with a curb cut and the luxurious opportunity for a private garage. Charged with expanding the house to enclose a car, we redesigned the facade and entry at garage level. IPE wood planks maintain a modest scale and restrained but intriguing visual texture.
A complete roof-deck makeover combines views and privacy in Manhattan’s lower east side. A cantilevered steel stair, sheltered in a wood planked bulk-head connects the original apartment to the deck. Finished in sustainably harvested ipe, the deck environment integrates plantings, outdoor showering and dining areas as well as concealed storage. The deck terminates at its north end in a screen of blue-grey concrete fiber board underscoring views on the city skyline.
The house begins as an existing earth-sheltered house, built quickly, efficiently, and cheaply along the Frying Pan River. We add an exposed, double-height space to bring sunlight in, maintaining the integrity of the buried structure and using the same shot-crete construction method. The interior is reconfigured to make best use of the vault and exploit the dramatic spatial qualities.
This house in Cobble Hill was a run-down, 3-family affair. MESH designed a complete renovation, preserving some elements while bringing kitchen and baths to modern standards. Historic and contemporary coexist harmoniously.
We will engineer a new digital informational system that supports, monitors, connects, and maintains the construction of a new physical home and landscape throughout the stages of its life. Building components, materials, and equipment are organized in an evolving database incorporating feedback from builders, manufacturers, and dwellers. Planning & Building Orientation and sitting, desired layout plans and materials, and construction methods are detailed. Living & Maintaining The C2C-OS (operating system) monitors the mechanical and electrical systems, assesses water, waste, temperature and weather, and makes decisions based on reducing energy consumption and increasing comfort. For example, is enough heat coming from solar heating or should the heat pump be switched on? Is the water cistern full? Is there a northern flicker in the nest box? Disassembly & Reuse When a component is taken out of service, whether as part of an upgrade, renovation, or complete demolition, the database contains information about disassembly, recycling and/or disposal.
Two apartments are joined through a thick, concrete shear wall. Revealing the rough concrete is a sensuous pleasure after naturalizing to the thin wallboard and parquet of the original spec apartment. Sure enough, there is more concrete beneath the surface, cryptically marked before it was clad. Thus a combination of new, polished materials and the raw, stripped-and-sutured points of subtraction and junction define the new union.
A renovation of two neighboring Nolita apartments, focusing on kitchen and baths, for a bachelor. The spaces are modest, so they open up for integrated living. The kitchen is outfitted in lab fixtures and cabinets. The bath, open to the bedroom, seduces with a warm, wood floor and a generous, pharmacy-style cabinet.
MESH recently finished a brownstone renovation in Ft. Greene. It’s a great example of how we are able to mix old with new and express the personality of a client, in this case an artist who loves to collect. A swath of red articulates vertical circulation and becomes a backdrop for a shrine and new media installations. Stripes and color define the guest bedroom creating new relationships between architectural elements.
MESH designed the amenity spaces for The Hub, a residential skyscraper in downtown Brooklyn
How do you take an old carriage house designed for horses and chickens and turn it into a functional, fully wired office space while preserving traces of its historical significance? MESH translated existing elements – the barn door opening becomes a glazed entry, the hay door a picture window, and the cupola a light shaft – and designed components to serve double duty- peeling away strips of the second floor exposes the old wood joists while creating a light well. The rafter ties become steel cables wired for lighting. Within only 1000 square feet, the reconfigured floors and variable lighting system provides a range of spatial experiences. Most of the lights are designed and built of plumbing pipe by the architect.