00:06Because of the size of this space, it's 420 square feet in total, we were trying to figure
00:12out how to best manipulate the space, making dense space with storage and creating volumes.
00:20How do we go about creating the largest void? And the idea of the bed became both the problem
00:27and became the solution simultaneously. So the problem is, what do you do with this large
00:33bed in a one room space? So what we decided to do was to flip it and make it the
00:39object
00:40in the space. So it's the elephant in the room. My name is Brian Masano with Masano O'Rourke.
00:45Welcome to my 420 square foot studio apartment located in the West Village of New York City.
01:04I've always wanted to be an architect. My father was, is an interior designer and that's
01:11what my first experience was visiting him at his studio. I was super interested in the
01:18way things were put together and also just the way architecture and design and interior
01:25design touched people's lives and how that people interacted with space and built form.
01:32My partner Toby O'Rourke and I created Masano O'Rourke in 1996 and we met in college. Our
01:39first project was for Donna Karan, a store for her in Santiago, Chile. Neil Drew, otherwise
01:45known as Drew, is my husband. We had been living in, and I had been living in, and working
01:50in the East Village since 1989, dating myself big time. And we're looking for an apartment
01:57to live in. And when I came to the space, I immediately looked at the view which is west
02:04facing and you can see the Hudson River and New Jersey and the Jefferson Market Library tower.
02:09I said, this is it. Moved into the space, I think we were here for about a year. The renovation
02:14of our apartment took eight months. Probably the biggest driving force for the length of the
02:20construction period was the size because you couldn't have like the plumber here and then
02:24the electrician there. Like everyone was on top of each other. The apartment is nicknamed or is called
02:31the jewel box. What Drew and I were trying to create is a space that is cozy. It has all
02:38the requirements of an apartment,
02:40but at the same time, the scale of a boutique hotel room. So every night it feels like, you know,
02:47we're coming home to a special place.
02:58The exterior of the jewel box is cladded in unlacquered or live brass, which patinas over time. It's a
03:07seven foot two by seven foot two by seven foot two cube. And the design is basically to fit a
03:14queen
03:14size bed and the cube opens up on three sides. With most studios, when you walk in, it's one space,
03:21you see it all. When we created the jewel box, this container starts to segment space and create layers
03:28of space. So we have the entry, the hallway, the great room, the container becomes the bedroom,
03:36but also because it's elevated and has storage underneath, that's our basement. And because
03:41we step up to the bed, that's our second floor. When we open up the doors, our bedroom really becomes
03:47the entire space. We want it to be more like a Donald Judd piece, an artistic piece, so it does
03:52not go to
03:53the ceiling. And it's not that we sleep with the doors closed, but it just gives it that feeling
03:58again, like it's an object that sits within a space. The jewel box acts as a piece of the architecture.
04:09Here are the closets.
04:12One of the challenges with a small space is how do you create plenty of space for storage? So what
04:18we
04:18did was we line both the north and south walls with storage. I don't know if we're minimalist,
04:24maybe we're reductivist, but visual noise really kind of shuts us down. So we create these containers
04:32to store books, shoes, clothing. Visually, it allows you to kind of really just focus on the space as
04:39opposed to all the different objects within the space. We've also included lighting within the closets.
04:45And so this also gives us sort of task lighting versus atmospheric lighting. So our atmospheric
04:51lighting, we have several vertical cove lights, which kind of is the sexy light. And this is the
04:58task light. So there are some lighting strategies that we used. One is separating volumes from walls,
05:05as opposed to slamming an object up against the wall. We create a vertical light pocket,
05:10and that gives us mood lighting slash sexy lighting.
05:17And this is my living room. Saturdays and Sundays, I'll drink coffee with our dog, Pius, who's
05:24decided he's too shy to attend this event. It's super comforting to be here in the evening. And we
05:30watch television, and usually I fall asleep on the sofa at some point. And then we retire to the toolbox.
05:37Everything in this apartment was meticulously thought of over and over and over again. So
05:43the idea of furniture, what scale, you know, whether or not we have full chairs to sit at,
05:49at the table or stools, everything was considered and I guess curated. Drew and I laid out with tape,
05:57every piece of furniture to see, is this the right distance from the kitchen so that we can cook and
06:02pass each other by? Is the area you're going to get in the way and you're going to trip? Every
06:07piece
06:07was really thought through to understand about scale and about function. The one thing that we
06:14struggle with is this coffee table and the objects that are on this coffee table. The number of books
06:19increases and decreases. The one thing that I would actually reduce the storage amount for clothing
06:27and add more bookshows because I have a bit of a habit and books always arrive and Drew is like,
06:33another book and what are you going to do with that book? So this is probably a little more curated
06:38than
06:38it normally is. The stacks are usually higher. A lot of designers, architects always hide the television,
06:44but honestly I love watching movies. So this was also important to us as well because we wanted a space
06:50where we could really hang out and enjoy movies. This television is recessed into this wall of storage
06:58which is lined with a quarter inch solid brass frame. So it feels very intentional. It's not just a
07:04television that's up on a wall.
07:15These doors fully retract and disappear so that they are not cumbersome and get in the way of
07:22cooking and moving around through the space. And we often do this in whether or not they're small
07:27spaces or large spaces. It's just much more convenient to get the doors out of the way. In keeping with
07:32the
07:32idea of reveal, this space transforms by revealing certain aspects of it. In this particular situation,
07:40we're revealing the kitchen which both Drew and I and my husband love to cook. So we have a fully
07:46functioning kitchen with a dishwasher, induction cooktop, combi oven, steam oven, and warming drawer. And
07:54then in addition we have full refrigerator and freezer. Shelf above with hidden light and a hidden light above as
08:04well which illuminates the whole kitchen. And then we have series of cupboards. And then we do sort of
08:13drawers within drawers to simplify the lines. This kitchen really is super functional and the idea of
08:22opening revealing it so we can cook. And then when we're not cooking, we can close the doors and
08:28conceal the kitchen and transform the space back into office mode or just chill space.
08:41This is our porch slash workspace. Before we started construction, Drew and I lived here for a year.
08:48This became really the place where we used to hang out and have breakfast, lunch and dinner, talk and stare
08:55out the window and kind of gaze across the city. We get these incredible sunsets where it completely
09:01transforms the entire space. It actually informed us on the design of this table which expands and
09:07there are actually two that are designed exactly the same but then they can reconfigure. So in this
09:13configuration we can set up to four but then these actually split apart and come together and we can
09:20do a party of six. As well as now since after COVID and we work remotely, it's basically our desk
09:26at the
09:26office. We have these two vertical light pockets. Also we really like the idea of not seeing the light
09:32source. Obviously as you come closer you see the light source but as you enter you just have these sort
09:36of glowing voids.
09:44So this is the bathroom and the bathroom is behind a secret door which is actually a break within the
09:52line of closets and the fumed oak and it's actually a mirror that you can both see yourself in to
09:59get
10:00ready before you leave but then you open it up and it reveals the bathroom. In order to kind of
10:06create
10:06the feeling of a larger space because it's actually smaller than a standard five by eight bathroom, we continue
10:12with the same stone that we use for the kitchen and all the walls and the floor are all Carrara
10:17marble
10:18and there are actually two hidden medicine cabinets where the Carrara marble is the door of the medicine
10:24cabinets and then there's a large floating mirror above the vanity that expands the space.
10:36In New York space is a valuable commodity and it's really important to master the art of space,
10:44of organization and making every space feel as large as possible while still being very functional.
10:51With this particular space what was exciting was the design is very much like a ship or a
10:57recreational vehicle where everything has to have a very specific place. I'm very happy. I'm very lucky
11:04I have a great relationship and amazing place to live in so I have no complaints.
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