Design: superkül inc.

Image Credits: Tom Arban Photography / Lorne Bridgman

The conversion of an industrial shed—from a blacksmith shop built in the early 1880s through a variety of industrial and commercial uses—to a single family home in 2009 is an example of a beautiful approach to urban sustainability and revitalization, laneway housing, and smaller footprint living.

Located on a 40’ x 18’ lot, it is built to the property lines on three sides, with 2’ to spare on the fourth. Current zoning regulations don not allow for additional openings in any of the walls, so the design strategy was to draw additional light, air and views from above. A light shaft topped by skylights runs the length of the west wall of the building, broken only by a courtyard on the second floor. The shaft brings light to the ground floor, and provides passive ventilation. On the second floor, a glass and wood wrapped courtyard separates the two bedrooms. From the courtyard, with its primary view to the sky, there is a small stair up to a roof garden.

The existing rusted steel cladding panels on the building were catalogued before they were removed. They were then brake-formed with a flat-lock seam and re-installed as the primary building skin. Black-stained knotty cedar clads the remainder of the building.