Photo: Alan Tansey
Unfolding Apartment
Normal Projects | Architecture
Normal Projects is a multidisciplinary architecture and design practice with partners in New York and Los Angeles. Our work includes residential and commercial architectural design, branding and creative direction, furniture and product design, and exhibition and event design. Our design process is research-intensive and innovation-oriented. We thrive on developing the potential of the most difficult and challenging design problems. The work of the office has been featured in a number of publications and design blogs, including Dwell, The New York Times, Apartment Therapy, and of course, Remodelista.
Firm principal Michael Chen currently teaches design studios and seminars at Pratt Insitute in Brooklyn and has taught previously at UC Berkeley, Cornell, Columbia, and Parsons.
Firm principal Kari Anderson currently teaches design studios at Woodbury University in Los Angeles and has taught previouslty at Cornell and Columbia
Firm Portfolio
Photo: Alan Tansey
Unfolding Apartment - Sleeping
Bigger than furniture; larger than architecture. A 400 square foot studio is equipped with all of the functional components of a much larger apartment, concealed within a reconfigurable cabinetry insert: bedroom, home office, library, closet, kitchen storage, and bar, plus most of the lighting and audiovisual equipment for the apartment
Photo: Alan Tansey
Unfolding Apartment - Console
Photo: Alan Tansey
Photographer's Loft - Wardrobe Partition
live-work space for a professional photographer in a former manufacturing building on the Lower East Side. Spatial flexibility is required as the loft is regularly used for photo shoots and editing, presentations, and events in addition to serving as the owner’s primary residence. To maximize open space, storage components and thickened storage zones within walls are used exclusively to delineate spaces.
Photo: Alan Tansey
Photographer's Loft - Media Partition
Typical drywall partitions are largely eliminated in favor of waxed ebonized walnut cabinetry. The cabinets absorb most of the storage, display, and partitioning functions of the loft.The existing nineteenth century shell of tin ceilings and rough plaster walls is retained and a series of back and gloss white inserts are introduced to define spatial zones and serve as clothing, work, and media storage and display units.
Photo: Alan Tansey
Aerated Apartment - Gallery and Kitchen
Green, but not crunchy. All of the interior partitions of a large apartment for a family on the Upper West side are designed to facillitate airflow and cross ventilation, effectively eliminating the need for air conditioning in the summertime.
Photo: Alan Tansey
Aerated Apartment - Den
Photo: Alan Tansey
Plaza Apartment - Library Shelving
A storage wall of laser-cut bent steel shelving in cantilevered from a lacquered CNC-milled surface with an ornate graduated surface. Library shelving is at the exterior of the partition; storage and a nursery is located inside.
Photo: Alan Tansey
Plaza Apartment - Nursery and Library
