Acquired by estate sale, a 3-story house had not been touched in decades. The layout was of another era, with the kitchen in the basement. We designed the kitchen in the middle of the main floor, between a front dining area and living room in the rear. Dark wood paneling and millwork was kept and coexists with a modern, lab-supply kitchen and custom, illuminated shelving.
Open kitchen, open bath. A client who wants a focused bathing experience. The tub is enclosed in a canopy of hinoki, an aromatic Oregon cedar. Color LED lights illuminate in programmed patterns. The study and bathroom are symmetrical about the tub, enabling it to be part of either space. In the bathroom, the tub is part of the cleaning processes; in the study, it becomes a place to explore, via the internet, while the body is suspended. The desk, lavatory, and kitchen counter are of the same material, plotting a triangle of work surfaces. The counter is cut to maximize work surface and space to gather around.
The duplex loft starts from the concept of a loft as a microcosmic urban space, an over sized setting for activities and events.By creating loosely connected zones with varied environments, the home becomes a dynamic setting for exploration and concentration.
The New York loft problem is a formidable design exercise. How many ways exist to program a loft for discrete activities without turning it into an apartment? MESH laterally divided the rectangular space into zones, putting public spaces in the front and private (bedroom) space in back. The space in between, though, is in constant flux. It is a library whose shelves can open completely or close to become a den, thus modulating the entire scheme. A 3-D concrete box contains the large bathroom and an indoor garden that serves as a gateway to the bedroom. The floor, walls, and ceiling of this bath are entirely in Panelite, a translucent, fiberglass composite panel. The lighting comes from outside the box – below the floor, above the ceiling – which creates an ethereal atmosphere within the bathroom, as if you are floating. In a somewhat surreal gesture, in this futuristic space the bathtub is a salvaged, old cast iron clawfoot model that perches, improbably, on the fiberglass floor. Meanwhile, the entire room acts as a kind of light fixture, illuminating and activating the space outside it, which is the central space of the large loft. Glimpses of activity within the bathroom are apparent, although the bathroom is generally private.
MESH has teamed up with The Brooklyn Home Company to design and build a new, four-home condominium building in the Columbia Street Waterfront District, at 84 Congress Street. Set opposite Van Voorhees Park, with views of the harbor and easy access to Cobble Hill, Red Hook, and the Atlantic Ave. artery, these four homes will set a new standard for this growing neighborhood. Each has outdoor space, and at night the façade will ripple with light in response to the harbor.
A new loft project completed in 2012. A spiral stair connects to the aerie above and provides access to the two story high bookshelf. A skylight and slab of transparent flooring allow light to filter to the kitchen below. The “media hearth” provides a warm, central core.
The familiar story: an old warehouse space becomes a home. A media wall slices through on the diagonal, connecting front to back while opening the central space to western views. Paneled in fiberglass-plastic, the wall is full of lighting, sound, and network cable. An opening in the wall allows an isolation cube on casters to emerge or act as a projection device. The master bathroom is necessarily located on the interior, without windows. A bathroom without natural light is unfortunate, and it became clear that the solution is to open the bathroom to the bright bedroom. The only divider between the spaces is a sliding parachute nylon curtain. When the bathroom is in use, as part of the morning or nightly routine, it becomes part of the bedroom, a sanitary annex to the private bedroom space. When not in use, closing the curtain shields the view of the fixtures and creates a soft, backlit wall for the bedroom. Thus the spaces may be reconfigured with little effort. The walls are tiled with a custom pattern, where each tile represents a digital pixel in a gradient image given to the manufacturer. The gradient reinforces the motif of a transition from white wall to blue, or water.
This loft renovation provides a new, downtown environment for an empty-nest single father. There are three major elements, inserted into the vast space: the (grown) children’s rooms, for when they stay here; the kitchen, seldom used but significant; and the master suite, a multi-story, dense, layered sequence of rooms. The karaoke room doubles as a projection screen. The mezzanine, passerelles, and massive bookshelf-wall are glass, in a light steel frame suspended from the ceiling. This creates the effect of a hovering partial presence, an in-between space mediating between the suite and the open space. The master bath is the most dense, enclosed, intimate space in the loft – in a way the heart of a large, open space. It is formed by a steel matrix whose spaces are filled with white oak dressing room cabinets. Each cabinet fits precisely into its assigned space in the grid. The glass catwalk that flows through the loft space enters the bathroom, allowing a perspective from above and access to extra clothing storage. A network of color-changing LED lights animates the loft space, and it enters this bathroom too, connecting it with the enclosing space of the loft. Building the small WC entailed raising the floor to install the plumbing lines. Instead of making a simple tile or stone floor, MESH took the opportunity to use this space, installing fluorescent lights underneath. A flooring material called Riverstone, small white pebbles suspended in green, translucent resin, glows dramatically, activating this narrow space. Chalkboard paint on the walls encourages (erasable) bathroom graffiti, to activate it further, and the lights were hand made by MESH.
It was a common brownstone cellar: dirt floor and 6’ headroom, with pipes and conduit tangled throughout. After underpinning and excavation we liberated a new habitable floor for a newly expanded family. Bright colors in the cabinetry, linoleum floor, and lightbox make up for the lack of regular windows, although the old coal chute, converted into a skylight, admits sunlight.
This historic house is on “Sportsman’s Row” in Park Slope— where jockeys of the 19th century hung their jodhpurs— was occupied by “Snapper” Garrison near the end of the Brooklyn jockey era.The challenge was to transform a classic tiny galley kitchen plus heavily trimmed dining room into an open space for family living. These spaces are typically generous but not large enough for a comfortable, open kitchen plus adjacent dining. We solved this with an oversized island that incorporates prep/cooking surface as well as family eating space and storage. We retained the wood trim and historic leaded glass windows but brightened and lightened the space with simple, modern cabinetry in bright yellow. We incorporated LED lighting strips into the wood trim.We modernized the bathrooms while retaining a sense of craft and pattern and tucked a large walk-in closet/dressing room behind the principal bedroom while retaining the architectural details.