Two new insertions redefine use and space within this urban townhouse. The first, a vertical tower of wood frames, railings and glass guards ascends the four story house, unifying the core, separating and fusing adjoining rooms with sliding walls. The second, a mural - glass, clear, mirrored and back painted - organizes and transforms the new twenty-five foot long bathing experience.
Frame and Insertion
The frame within which we began our alterations was a 1960's brick rowhouse in the Society Hill section of the city. The simple plan was three rooms deep at each of the three levels. An open skylit stairwell occupied the central plan bay at each floor, allowing the penetration of light at the house core. Our insertions were woven throughout this nine part frame without modifications to its structure.
Tower Stair
The major insertion was in, over, through and around the existing stair treads. A vertical tower composed of mahogany wood ladders on all four sides occupies the central stair well from basement to attic level skylight. Mahogany hand rails step up at each corner of the tower, spiraling about the ladders, flight by flight, as the stair winds its way to the uppermost level. Below the handrails, glass panels act as transparent guards between stair and well. The reflections of toplight off the glass guards multiply the dizzying spiral of treads, ladders, and rails, transforming a banal stair well into an endlessly spiraling tower stair.
Room Screens
The tower stair sits within mahogany screen frames at the landing edges that define the stair as a room within the house. These screen frames modify their infill depending upon circumstance. Between the lowest landing and the living room, they are open. Between the stair and the rear kitchen, a sliding panel composed of translucent glass permits either separation or continuity of the space. The house may be open through from front to back or closed depending upon the position of translucent screens.
Bathing
The largest room in the reconfigured home is the master bathroom located on level two. It extends almost twenty-five feet from the rear master bedroom to the house front. It is about two and one-half times as long as it is wide. Several types of glass - clear, translucent, mirrored and back painted - are used to transform this narrow room into a reflecting hall. A mural composed of mirrored and back painted white, grey and black glass extends above the marble sinks parallel to the long axis of the room. Depending upon glass type, it reflects images both clearly and obscurely in an array that shifts ceaselessly with the occupant's movement. Beyond the mural, a clear and obscure glass shower enclosure extends into the room, perpendicular to the mirror wall, screening views through to the large tub beyond. A sauna and toilet compartment are embedded in the opaque walls opposite the glass mural.
© 1997– KieranTimberlake
[ 420 N 20 Street, Philadelphia PA 19130.3828 | V 215 922 6600 F 215 922 4680 ]
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