In Stuttgart, VON M studio has recently completed two private dwellings that combine the severe character of concrete with the domesticity of spaces. The project, developed along steep terrain, grafts the units onto two slightly staggered levels, producing an unexpected dynamism.

The two bodies are built using prefabricated concrete blocks, leaving the facades’ design to the joints’ geometry. This transforms the technical element into a decorative theme, exalting the use of the material and revealing the architects’ attention to detail. Thus, the concrete elements characterize the two apartments, which dialogue with each other through broken lines, solids, and voids, building a minimal and vibrant design simultaneously.

The essentiality of the external spaces is then projected into the internal distribution. Here it is possible to recognize a clear difference between served and serving spaces for all floors. The first one opens with the living area, where the kitchen and living room hybridize in a continuous space, leaving total permeability even with the outside.

On the upper floors, the sleeping area divides the various partitions, where each threshold is characterized by a wooden element that defines the space.

Finally, the two similar units present a unique circular window in the southeast apartment. This opens onto the back of the houses, where we find the terraced gardens. The small gardens, obtained through a process of excavation, redesign the slope, configuring a protected space towards the hill.

The project thus finds its poetics in the clarity of its volumes, digging out domestic spaces and urban scenes from time to time.