00:01I love mid-century furniture and I love collecting them.
00:06The building was built in 1960.
00:10In this period, I loved the materials that were used,
00:14so I wanted to use the same kind of materials that were available in that moment.
00:20To get the 50s look, I used the furniture I've been collecting for years
00:26to give me the atmosphere in that period.
00:31My name is Jacobo Valenti.
00:34I'm an architect from Barcelona.
00:36I live here with my dog, Ron.
00:46The apartment is in the center of Barcelona, in a neighborhood called Eixampla.
00:52The neighborhood was designed to connect the ancient heart of the city with the suburbs.
00:59The apartment is 37 square meters, including the terrace.
01:05The first time I came into the apartment was kind of a sad space, depressing.
01:12The layout was completely wrong.
01:14The bathroom was too big and the living area was too small.
01:18I demolished the wall at the entrance of the apartment, which was the oversized old bathroom.
01:25My goal was to have a terrace, so I moved three square meters from indoor to outdoor.
01:32Another decision was to split the bathroom and have toilet on one end, the apartment, and the shower in the
01:40other.
01:40I turned the kitchen around to create a corridor with kitchen in both sides of the space.
01:53When you enter through the door, you will find a wooden wall, which is part of the wardrobe.
01:58The position of the wardrobe helps to abstract the inside of the apartment when standing at the entrance.
02:07An artwork is covering the electric box and a collection of keys.
02:12Through a sliding door on the right is the toilet.
02:16There is a small sink inside and lots of art on the walls.
02:20I cut a curtain and hang it covering the toilet tank, giving the effect of a wall-mounted toilet.
02:27Behind the curtain, I can store toilet paper and hide the brush.
02:32The kitchen works as a corridor between the entrance and living areas.
02:37This is a good trick to save space.
02:41The kitchen is wooden with a stainless steel countertop and backsplash.
02:47On one side, there is a sink, a fridge, a washing machine, and the laundry.
02:51All this lower part is an IKEA kitchen, but covered in the same wood that I've used in this area
02:58of the apartment.
03:00Also, in this part, we find the cabinet by Charlotte Perriand.
03:04It's an original mid-century piece and has a lot of room for glass, dishes, and food storage.
03:10On the other side of the kitchen, there is an induction cooktop and an oven.
03:15Although it's a small kitchen, it feels big because it's wider and taller than a regular kitchen.
03:23The living area is a versatile space that can be used as a living room, a dining room, and sometimes
03:30as my office when I'm working from home.
03:33There is an IKEA sofa which can fall down and become a bed for guests.
03:37It's also used as one of the seats for the dining table.
03:42I built a custom wood frame around the sofa, and there is storage in the right side of the sofa
03:48to keep blankets and to connect chargers.
03:52For storage, I customized an interesting Danish piece of furniture from the 60s.
03:58It's a low unit that sits by the wall at the end of the bed.
04:01Above is my record player and vinyls.
04:05Inside, I store my shoes and the amplifier.
04:10The big bed sits in the open space.
04:14The closet storage is an IKEA closet which has mirror doors to give the illusion of a bigger space.
04:21I wrapped wood around the closet and created floating shelves at the end.
04:26Above the wardrobe is the porthole which was originally from a boat.
04:31It can be opened up for ventilation.
04:36The projector is mounted above the bed and projects directly onto the wall.
04:43The bathroom is right next to the terrace with a big piece of glass in between, serving very good views
04:50when you shower.
04:51As I live here by myself, I didn't feel the need to put the bathroom in a separate room.
04:56So, the sink is a part of the main living space.
05:00This frees up some space in a small apartment.
05:03I used the same yellow tiles as the terrace.
05:06This gave some more outdoor feeling to the bathroom.
05:09On the side of the bathroom, I made a small niche to use as a small bedside storage.
05:17The apartment is an attic, so it has very good views and very good light.
05:24The terrace is the jewel of the apartment.
05:27It works as living, dining, office, green area and it even has a lemon tree.
05:34In the warmer months, I have every meal in the terrace.
05:39I try to find a balance between collectible pieces with some other pieces like an IKEA kitchen or everyday objects
05:50that you can buy in a free market.
05:52It's very important to give second life for things and buildings because you don't waste the resources.
06:01My goal for this kind of projects is to feel as you are in a bigger space.
06:09Putting together in the same place a lot of uses and then finding the proper objects and piece of furniture
06:17for the apartment.
06:19It's very important.
06:21Thanks for watching and if you're an architect or designer with a project we could feature,
06:26please share it with us at nevertosmall.com slash submissions.
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