The apartment is in a three-story walk-up, built in 1960, and the unit is one of 18 in the building.

This apartment is 49 square meters.

The client had a very clear understanding of what they wanted.

They wanted to carry the same ambience that was in this place already over to the renovation.

However, he needed vast improvements to functionality.

The client is certainly not interested in reductivism and he will continue to accumulate things, so ample storage was very, very important.

We removed a series of walls that divided the master bedroom from the rest of the apartment, and we shifted the sleeping space into what was the old bathroom.

The old bathroom went into what was the old laundry, and what was the master bedroom became an art studio and a sleeping space for guests.

By removing the walls, we decided to insert a really large storage pod into the center of the unit.

The new insertions were realized in mirror gold.

The reflective gold is really quite dynamic in that it reflects the light, and it amplifies the effect of all of the trees and the plants that the client has dotted around the apartment.

Inserting the pod enabled us to demarcate spaces and distribute zones.

And that pod contains all of his clothing, general dump storage, a laundry, art supplies, and also a niche where he can create art.

We used black in the art space niche.

It's quite reductive. It doesn't detract from the effect of the mirror gold.

It's much easier to keep clean with all of the mess related to the art, and there's some continuity because the front of the pod is imagined entirely in black.

The sleeping nook is where the original bathroom was, we conduced it to fit in a queen bed.

The gold panels make the sleeping nook feel like a much larger space than it otherwise would.

The sleeping nook is elevated by two steps, so that we can store a pullout bed underneath.

So that on the other side of the pod, a bed can be pulled out for guests, and the room can be shut off with the use of a curtain that retracts from the pod.

The soft light that emanates from the junction of the storage pod in the wall draws the eye through the rear of the space.

The client had a desire to have plants in every space within the apartment, and that included in the bathroom.

So we created a small soaker-tub-cum-shower and then a secondary tub, if you like, to house a garden.

We used a reflective white tile and a white shower curtain to create a very light, airy, and bright space, which is offset with the polished gold tapware.

The kitchen has all of the functionality and amenity of a regular kitchen.

However, it's completely concealed.

All of the appliances are hidden because it was important that the kitchen be probably the most recessive component within the design.

There's an under bench integrated fridge, oven, dishwasher, cooktop.

There are no overhead storage. Instead that space has been reserved for art to again help the kitchen blend into its environment.

We decided to paint the walls in a semi-gloss rather than a flat paint, and the paint continues from the walls up to the ceiling.

Even with all of the decoration, there's a calmness and a continuity to the space because the tile pervades every space.

This sort of building stock has great access to light and to breeze.

And by removing all of the partitioning in the apartment and starting the layout again, the spatial organization again, we've unlocked a whole heap of new potential.