HOUSE XYZ / Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

© Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

In 2017, Kwong Von Glinow Design Office designed House XYZ taking a warehouse as a reference. The installation brings together all of the objects that make a house a place of domesticity and erases building constraints such as walls and floors.

HOUSE XYZ Technical Information

What can it mean to live in a house where in a limited area, every space can be used in any direction without obstructions such as corridors, multiple floors, or even interior walls? Can we discover how the suspension of dimensions can create a new way of thinking about our life in a house?

– Kwong Von Glinow Architects

HOUSE XYZ Photographs
HOUSE XYZ / Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

© Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

HOUSE XYZ / Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

© Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

HOUSE XYZ / Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

© Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

HOUSE XYZ / Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

© Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

Text by the Architects

When we imagine being in our home, we usually begin by navigating through it conventionally as we would when we are walking in the actual space. Without much thought, we can close our eyes and imagine effortlessly what we can do in each space or how to reach anything within.

We think about these things without the consideration of barrier or effort. Our sequence of movement can be shuffled out of order so that we can skip from the downstairs kitchen to the upstairs laundry room. House XYZ does just this. It brings together all of the objects that make a home a place of domesticity – a bed for sleeping, a tub for bathing, a kitchen countertop for cooking, etc. The dimension of these items are human dimensions, made for daily use, which cross-culturally define our domestic routine of living.

House XYZ erases the architecturally imposed constraint of walls and floors and suspends our domestic items. The ceiling track inscribes in two dimensions the circulation that occurs three-dimensionally. “Rooms” are
re-configured within a single volume by coordinates X, Y, and Z – an invisible raumplan – where everything is visually and spatially accessible. What can it mean to live in a house where in a limited area, every space can be used in any direction without obstructions such as corridors, multiple floors, or even interior walls? Can we discover how the suspension of dimensions can create a new way of thinking about our life in a house?

HOUSE XYZ Floor Plan
Floor Plan - HOUSE XYZ / Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

Floor Plan | © Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

HOUSE XYZ Image Gallery
About the Kwong Von Glinow Design Office

Lap Chi Kwong and Alison Von Glinow co-founded Kwong Von Glinow Design Office in Chicago in January 2017.  Since then, the office has been awarded several prizes including the 2018 Architectural League Prize for Young Architects.  Their office is currently working on several projects in Chicago, New York, Switzerland, and Hong Kong.

Other works from Kwong Von Glinow Design Office  

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