The striking residence by Steime Architect, a monolith designed of insulating concrete is located on a quiet street with little traffic in the village of Pliezhausen, a good 30 km south of Stuttgart, Germany. Facing the street, the new building presents only a few openings cut deeply into the solid concrete shell. While the crystal-shaped house still relates to the existing built context due to its parallel elongated sides, it contrasts distinctly with the neighboring buildings by virtue of the tapered ends formed by its shorter sides.

It is this oblique arrangement of the facades that enables the building to open out to the surrounding outdoor spaces and to offer its inhabitants unexpectedly expansive views in the distance. A conventional gable roof and the gently rising terrain reinforce the angular, sculptural effect of the house, which is designed on a hexagonal ground plan.
Upon entering the house through its entrance cut deep into the concrete mass, you first reach the garden room. From here, a single-flight stair leads up to the residential level. The quite narrow and high entrance area morphs into a space that opens upward but is clearly bounded by the multiple folds of the roof form: as you move through the house, constriction and expansion, enclosure and openness enter into an exciting, constantly shifting dialogue. The window openings set horizontally into the 50 cm thick concrete shell create a framed view of the surroundin...