Making a place to dwell; Finding a place within the city: how architects are reconfiguring the urban home.

How do we find a place in which to dwell? In dense cities what options are available, apart from terrace, villa, or the ubiquitous (not-so) luxury apartment? As the market continues to frustrate, discerning residents are increasingly looking elsewhere, no longer willing to accept what is on offer from youthful, enthusiastic, commission paid estate agents; those who enjoy well proportioned suits, contemporary ties, and recently refurbished minds.

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In cities like London there are many poorly converted houses from which to choose: those that are either inadequate for family life--with little space to swing a child--or those that have been greedily carved up into contorted and unsatisfactory flats, with acoustically adjoined neighbours. There are also plenty of overpriced, so-called executive apartments, complete with micro balconies, fan-assisted bathrooms and extortionate mis-management fees. Such dissatisfaction should of course come as little surprise, with a tiny proportion of our homes being architect designed. What is surprising, however, is that people continue to spend hundreds of thousands of pounds on fundamentally flawed products. Unlike any other commodity, time and time again poorly designed, inadequate and unsustainable developments are sell outs; simultaneously making huge profits for developers and a huge mess of our cities.

Yet when it comes to the issue of domestic bliss, architects can help people to realise their dreams in more ways than is immediately obvious. Furthermore, compared with the mark-up prices charged by volume house builders, an architect's services are also relatively cheap, while bringing a more significant added value to long-term property investments. Long before the house-warming party, before proud owners embark on their new spatially lubricated lifestyles--even, on occasions, before a site is found--architects can bring vision and promise to impossible sites and hostile urban situations.

In recent years Japan has led the private market of commissioned one-off city-centre houses. As illustrated in Small in Japan (AR Sept 2005), there are many fine examples where the architect and client's vision have proved extremely effective in optimising site, type and technique. In this issue Atelier Tekuto's razor sharp slim house (p56), is another exciting response to Tokyo's unique morphology Other countries too are beginning to raise their game, through the lateral thinking of architects who seek to challenge convention with strategies that either conform or challenge local planning restrictions; exemplified in this issue by Titus Bernhard's gabion house in Germany (p58), and Fearon Hay Architects' curious agro-industrial living shed in New Zealand (p62), both of which interpret planning codes in their own ways (albeit in non-urban contexts). We begin, however, with a trilogy of projects based in London; a city not widely known for its contribution to the evolution of the private home.

Challenging types: responding to patterns of urban life

Unlike Tokyo or LA, London is more widely recognised for its contribution to collective forms of housing; the terraces and squares of Nash, and more recently through the modern movements of Lubetkin, Lasdun, Neave Brown, and Powell and Moya. There are, of course, a number of exemplary private homes, past and present, such as those by Michael Hopkins (AR Dec 1977) and John Winter (AR Sept 1981). However, in this issue, an attempt has been made to consider less conspicuous examples; examples that are arguably more realistic, attainable and applicable to generic urban conditions.

The projects selected represent a reasonable range of cost and scale, with Graham Bizley's modest 99sqm end of terrace (below and p50), Jamie Fobert's 294sqm refurbishment in Primrose Hill (top left and p46), and Caruso St John's exquisite 380sqm four bedroom Brick House (bottom left and p38). Distinct in form, all three address a consistent set of concerns, seeking radical alternatives to the options available on the market, with Graham Bizley refusing to take his first step on the property ladder by purchasing a low grade pokey flat (choosing instead to build his own house at an equivalent cost), and both Fobert and Caruso St John's clients seeking a new scale of domestic space, that is neither open plan nor conventionally cellular. All three also consider the changing nature of the city, demonstrating how to optimise space, light and views, on apparently unworkable sites or within forlorn existing properties.

Whether refurbishing or building from new, it is possible to make a place in which to dwell, and as this representative array of new homes shows, it is not a case of keeping up with the Joneses. Instead, in each case, these new homes show the Joneses, the Chans and the Schmidts how it should be done; how to eke out a place in the city where tailor-made, bespoke homes can be created; and how to beat the market by not having to conform to overpriced, tasteless, rip-off-and-run speculative developments.

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