Belgium-based Adjo Studio has used large wooden joinery elements to organise the interior of a penthouse apartment in Hasselt.
Penthouse BV features a broken-plan layout, meaning that it is neither open-plan nor divided into rooms. Instead, a series of partitions and furniture elements help to subtly divide the space into different areas.
Spanning floor-to-ceiling and made from cheery wood veneer, these elements include bookshelves, kitchen cabinets and wardrobe closets.
The penthouse is the home of an entrepreneurial couple who relocated from the suburbs to the city centre.
Adjo Studio designers Adriana Strojek and Joachim Bekker wanted to give the pair the same feelings of spaciousness and connection to nature that they had experienced in their previous residence, even though they are now five storeys up.
However, they also needed to create a practical home with separation between different functions. For instance, the couple needed a dedicated office so that work and home activities didn’t clash.
As Penthouse BV was originally open-plan, the designers had free rein to draw up a layout that met both of these requirements.
The apartment is also positioned at the centre of a roof terrace, with glazed walls wrapping most of the exterior, so it was easy to create light-filled spaces facing planted terraces.
“The couple wanted to preserve the qualities of living in a house with a garden, so the brief required a spacious, open plan with as much natural light incidence as possible,” said Strojek and Bekker.
“This request triggered us to locate the circulation space on the perimeter of the penthouse, to strengthen the relation between the inside and the 360-degree private city garden,” they told Dezeen.
The joinery elements not only organise spaces, but also create flexibility. One of the closets integrates a bathroom entrance, while another includes a sliding wall that allows the bedroom and office to become a single space.
Other furniture elements are just as grand in ambition, like the combined kitchen island and dining table, or the full-height hearth that frames the lounge and library areas.
The designers chose a sophisticated palette of materials and colours for the interior, with shades of grey, brown and beige. The aim was to provide a “cheerful yet restful environment”.
The grey Italian limestone that clads the walls surrounding the terrace was one source of inspiration. Natural stone features throughout the home, with subtle beige tones in the living spaces and a more decorative finish in the bathrooms.
Furnishings bring together classic designs of the past and present, with highlights including an Eames Lounge Chair and the Lumina DOT pendant light by Foster + Partners.
Other details reveal the owners’ tastes. A pair of armchairs in the living room are coloured in a favourite red ochre shade, as are various other objects dotted through the spaces.
“The details are kept simple in aim to reach minimalist objectivity, stripping away the layers of ornaments to create clean perspectives and frame the outside,” added the designers.
Other recent residential projects in Belgium include an apartment on the Belgian coast with seaweed-coloured joinery and a Ghent penthouse organised around three blocks of furniture.
Photography is by Renaat Nijs.
