Extension to a private house, Stockholm

On a steep slo­ping site in Lillängen in Nacka stands a di­la­pi­da­ted but fun­da­men­tally nice and hum­ble house from the 1930s.

Our pro­ject re­ar­ranges both flo­ors of the ex­is­ting house and adds a ply­wood-clad ex­ten­sion on its backside.

The ex­is­ting stair is torn down and re­pla­ced by a new centrally pla­ced stair li­be­ra­ting one short end of the house. The new stair and a new bat­hroom form a new cen­tral core around which the entrance floor is ar­ranged. The kit­chen is mo­ved out into the new ex­ten­sion and a new se­quence of rooms, from the steep slo­ping north side of the plot via the kit­chen and the living room to the new south-fa­cing ter­race, is cre­a­ted. The main be­droom is pla­ced centrally in the house while two mi­nor be­drooms are kept in their ori­gi­nal po­si­tions to­wards the west façade, now con­nec­ted via a com­mon play loft.

The ba­se­ment houses a big com­mon space, a bat­hroom, washing fa­ci­li­ties, sto­rage and a bi­cycle garage.

The ex­is­ting win­dows and façade pa­ne­ling are wornb down and needs re­pla­cing. The new pa­ne­ling re­sem­bles the old. New win­dows are car­ried out in matte-lac­que­red oak on both the ori­gi­nal house and the ex­ten­sion. In ret­hin­king the plan the faca­des have been ad­justed to bet­ter suit the new spa­tial or­ga­ni­za­tion. The top of the win­dows has been ra­i­sed in or­der to let more light, sky and tre­e­tops in.

The ply­wood box is de­fi­ned by th­ree big win­dow ope­nings. One stan­ding fixed win­dow framing the nort­hern slope, one high, ope­nable win­dow above the kit­chen top and a wide win­dow be­hind the kit­chen sofa ope­ning out to­wards the new mor­ning terrace.

The box is built on a strict mo­dule and is clad in façade ply­wood. The jo­ints are co­ve­red with wooden ba­tons. All parts of the façade are pain­ted I the same tone of warm grey.

The plan al­lows for a re­la­ti­vely large ex­ten­sion, but the buil­dable area is li­mi­ted to a thin wedge of land on the east of the ex­is­ting house. We’ve let the wedge shape in­form the structure and form of the ex­ten­sion. The plan is ba­sed on a mir­ror-sym­metri­cal, leaf-sha­ped structure where ex­te­rior walls and a lon­gi­tu­di­nal cen­tral beam carry trans­ver­sal beams per­pen­dicu­lar to the cen­tral beam. A concrete ba­se­ment car­ries two wooden sto­ries. The ba­se­ment houses a spa, the two sto­ries above house be­drooms, a bat­hroom, and a com­mon room. The ori­gi­nal house and the ex­ten­sion are con­nec­ted via a nar­row glass link. Along the south façade to­wards the gar­den, a wooden deck fun­c­tio­nally ties the dif­fe­rent parts of the buil­ding to­get­her du­ring the war­mer months.

The plan­ning re­gu­la­tions dictate an ex­ten­sion for­mally quite dif­fe­rent to the ori­gi­nal ar­chi­tecture. The ex­ten­sion is nar­ro­wer and only al­lows for one room in depth giving it a more clo­sed façade to­wards the street and a more open façade to­wards the gar­den in the south. The load-be­a­ring structure of the ex­ten­sion is mir­ro­red in the façade, where re­lief in the wooden pa­ne­ling cre­a­tes a clear or­der and directs the pla­ce­ment of openings.

In con­jun­c­tion with the con­struc­tion of the ex­ten­sion, the ori­gi­nal house will be re­no­va­ted. Both will be pain­ted in the same shade of light grey but will be gi­ven dif­fe­rent win­dow colors.