Who doesn’t wish they had more space in their home? Unfortunately, most of the time we don’t have the luxury of being able to expand, so to allude to more space architects are using the outside as another level and an additional room. 

A simple way of including the outdoors into a building is to create a decking area, which helps form a seamless flow from the indoor flooring to the outdoor decking.

This prefabricated home is a perfect example as it has been designed to encourage indoor-outdoor living with 3 double doors opening along one wall, opening up to the outdoors with an integrated decking section. Created by Muji the single-storey home is named Yō no Ie has been designed to suit a rural setting. With only  74-square-metre space, this home provides a fluid layout with no fixed divides or columns, allowing the house to change with the user’s needs.

For those who truly wish to be one with nature, another way to integrate the outside with the inside is to create an outdoor shower space.

The Buhaus was designed with this in mind, this tiny build provides multiple uses, including the bathroom opening out to an outdoor shower experience. Buhaus is a prefabricated home originally designed to provide clients with a fire-resistant temporary home. However, due to its unique luxury take on a shipping container building, it has now become an extra guest suite for landowners. 

Outdoor dining is common in most homes these days, but what about outdoor cooking?  We don’t just mean a BBQ in the height of summer, an outdoor kitchen could provide a great way of interconnecting the outdoors with the traditional indoors. This could be from the mansion in LA with a fully functioning kitchen to a small brick pizza oven in a UK backyard. 

Extending the kitchen to outside will let the space flow better and provide another ‘reception’ room. The Splinter Creek house’s kitchen creates a unique way of cooking and dining, as this is the main kitchen they will always be cooking and dining outside.

With strict planning in areas like London, building out or using the garden is not an option, the answer for some architects is to ‘build down’ instead! When designing an underground space, creating a natural light rich area below the building level can be difficult. However, in this example, Belsize Architects have managed it with this Grade II listed building in Central London. The extension used fully glazed windows on one wall as well as the ceiling, which allowed them to access as much light as possible. 

Clever reflections and good lighting also help create the effect of natural light.   

JDW Architects

Here at JDW Architects we have got plenty of ideas and innovations to make the best use of the space you have. Contact us on 016 3324 5020 or email us at info@jdwarchitects.com.