Towns looked very different back in the 1950s, and not only here in the States. The before and after pictures of this renovated house in Vancouver, Canada proves our point exactly.
The owners of this house asked Randy Bens, a very talented Canadian architect, to add a new floor to what became their unfitting house. They wanted a new place for the two of them upstairs and decided to leave the older, restored part of the house to their three sons. The original house was an ‘L’ shaped bungalow and that’s where Randy Bens started from.
The owners (an artist and a psychologist) didn’t want to make their home look like it couldn’t fit the scenery anymore, due to the intensive modernization program. So the architect kept some ‘50s and ‘60s elements of the house (like the vertical cedar siding or the sloping roofs) and simply gave them a more contemporary look. To offer the whole structure more cohesion, the house is wrapped in rolled zinc panels that seamlessly unite the old and the new floors.
Inside everything is warm and inviting. The modern interior design is pleasant with a perfect combination of light wood colors and off-white walls. Even though modern materials were also used here (like steel, glass and concrete), the Screen House is far from having a cold, uninviting appearance. On the contrary, it is one of the best balanced homes we’ve seen so far.
