Published in Houzz

Reasons to Show Your Home Who's Gloss

Our first Micro Apartment is featured on Tiny House Nation

David introduces it in the Tiny House Nation episode below. You Can see the David and our design by jumping to minute 21. It is about 2 minutes long. Check it out!

http://www.fyi.tv/shows/tiny-house-nation/videos/204-sq-ft-climbing-gym 

The Construction of our Micro Apartment

More images will follow, but here is a little taste. The General Contractor is testing our foldable wall and bunk beds during construction.

The Beginning

Resource Furniture beds and lower cabinets are installed

Red cabinet and soffit cabinets are being installed

Bathroom/ medicine cabinet door

Sliding panel for painting is installed

All cabinets but movable kitchen island are in

Folding wall in front of bunk beds in open position

Micro Apartment Design

Foyer and Gallery Space

Early in 2014, the owners of a small Manhattan studio approached DAS Studio with a request to convert their 320 sqft space into a high-functioning micro-apartment. The desire was to have all the functionality of a full-sized apartment within the footprint of this tiny studio. On taking on this challenge, we identified the minimal design objective of needing to incorporate four fully functional spaces into one room - a dining room seating 12, a master bedroom, guest room for two. The owners also needed enough storage space for their extensive china collection, hanging space to display their art collection, including a 4' x 10' painting and room for an entertainment system. Further, space needed to be accounted for a work desk that could be separated from the sleeping area in case one of the owners were still asleep. We set out to achieve all the above while still creating a space that was open and generous.


The following renderings showing the different possible apartment configurations. Photos of the apartment will follow soon.

During day time a living

During night time a master bedroom with guest bedroom option

During day time master bed becomes a couch and guest beds collapse behind folding wall

During night time master bed opens over couch and guest beds pull out behind folding wall 

Daytime configuration with couch and sliding panel/ art wall

Night time configuration with master bed and folding wall

Weidlinger House Kickstarter Campaign

Help the Cape Cod Modern House Trust save this important modern house, and transform it into a home for creativity and learning.

Go to http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1506263890/weidlinger-house-restoration to help restoring this important architectural gem.

Weidlinger House Restoration

Due to a lack of resources from the Park Service, this irreplaceable piece of our cultural heritage ended up abandoned and slated for demolition in the pristine landscape of the Cape Cod National Seashore. The Cape Cod Modern House Trust (CCMHT) has obtained a lease and begun a full restoration, which we hope to finish, with your help, by July, 2014. This Kickstarter campaign is to raise $50,000 toward that goal.

The Weidlinger House in 1953 soon after construction. Photo: Madeliene Weidlinger-Friedli

The same corner of the house as it looks today. Photo: Dave Kennedy

The House

In 1952, Paul Weidlinger bought this secluded parcel of land in Wellfleet. Inspired by his friend, the famed architect Marcel Breuer, who had settled just across the pond, he set out to combine his vision of experimental modernism with the particular requirements of a Cape Cod summerhouse.

The structure hovers over the landscape, a perfect platform for viewing the unspoiled pond and woods. While the three bedrooms and bath are enclosed and rest just above the ground, the open, expansive living space vaults into the air on X braced stilts, a 16-foot wide sliding door opening to the views. The four foot deep veranda surrounds the house, accessed by a flying ramp. The original palette of cobalt blue for doors and window frames and school bus yellow for the steel struts will soon be repainted.

A view of the veranda facing the pond. 1953. Photo: Madeliene Weidlinger-Friedli

The living room in it’s original state. Photo: Madeliene Weidlinger-Friedli

 Paul Weidlinger

Born in Budapest in 1914, Paul Weidlinger apprenticed in Paris with LeCorbusier and London with Lazlo Maholy Nagy before coming to the US and starting his own practice. He specialized in the most daunting structural problems, including pioneering the earthquake and blast proofing of structures and was sought out by many of the giants of modern architecture to help realize their most challenging designs. Following his lead, after 911 his successor firm Weidlinger Associates Inc. was called upon to analyze the collapses of the World Trade Center Towers.

Why was the building vacant?

After the Cape Cod National Seashore was created in 1961, a number of important modern houses were bought by the Federal Government and fell into administrative limbo. The Weidlinger house (one of these) has been derelict for 15 years. Though it will soon be listed on the National Registry, protecting it from demolition, the house is in urgent need of restoration to stop further decay.

Our crew opening up the boarded up sliding doors facing the pond. Photo: Tom Weidlinger

The pond side of the house today. Photo: Raimund Koch

 The Cape Cod Modern House Trust (CCMHT)

Incorporated in 2007 as a 501c3 non-profit, CCMHT has secured a lease on the house and plans to resume work on the restoration in Nov. 2013, with completion planned for summer 2014. The Trust has already leased and restored two abandoned modern houses in Wellfleet owed by the National Park Service. Both were made possible by previous, successful fundraising campaigns. These houses act as artist/scholar residencies in the shoulder seasons. In 2012 we hosted six teams of finalists in our Add-on ’13 affordable housing competition (see our blog for details) The effort sought to bring fresh thinking to the Outer Cape’s serious housing problem. Past residents have included painters, film makers, composers, and researchers (among other disciplines). The houses also serve as premiums for membership. Members receive weekly stays in the houses in return for a partially tax-deductible donation. 

Please help us save the Weidlinger House and make it a laboratory for a new generation of problem solvers.

Please attend one of our upcoming events and learn more about the project:

EVENTS: 2013/14

Oct. 9th 

Launch of Kickstarter campaign to fund restoration of the Weidlinger House (Paul Weidlinger, 1953) by Cape Cod Modern House Trust.

Oct. 9th

Opening of Add-on ’13 exhibit.

Boston Society of Architects gallery

http://bsaspace.org/exhibitions/conditionsenvironments/

Co-sponsored by DOCOMOMO

Screenings of “Built on Narrow Land” Documentary by Malachi Connolly:http://www.narrowland.org/

Oct 9th, 6:00pm

Boston Society of Architects

290 Congress Street Boston, MA

http://bsaspace.org/exhibitions/conditionsenvironments/

(Along w/ opening on the Add-on ’13 finalist exhibit)

Oct 18, 6:15pm

Architecture and Design Film Festival

Tribeca Cinemas NY,NY

http://adfilmfest.com/portal/1462

Nov 2nd, 2:00pm

Cape Cod National Seashore Headquarters

50 Nauset Road Eastham, MA

Nov. 9th

End of Kickstarter campaign, re-start of renovation project.

May 2014.

Publication of Cape Cod Modern: Midcentury Architecture and Community on the Outer Cape, by Peter McMahon and Christine Cipriani, with photography by Raimund Koch. Published by Metropolis Books.