Name: Small Heritage Home Restored for Family Living, Buenos Aires 56sqm/603sqft
Uploaded: 2025-05-26T09:15:04.000Z
Duration: 10 min 24 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

The original house dates back to the early 20th century and has always served as a residence.

Transition words & phrases

Today the house works really well for me and my family, and even though it's not huge, the spaces themselves are open and filled with natural light.

Basic passive voice

I was inspired by our casas chorizo in the area.

I like seeing the renovations and how they highlighted its original features and preserved as much of them as they could.

So during our renovations we wanted all the new materials to be locally sourced with natural colors that work with the original features of the house.

My name is Laura, I'm an interior architect and this is my home.

I live here with my husband Juan and our four-year-old son Pedro.

The house is in Temperley in the outskirts of Buenos Aires.

It's a peaceful English-style neighborhood from the late 19th century with mostly low-rise houses.

It's also really convenient with lots of little shops run by the owners where we do most of our shopping.

The previous owners had covered up the patio and our main priority was to bring the patio back to life.

We also wanted to be able to access all rooms in the house without going through the outdoor space.

Our priority was to create one big comfortable and bright living space where the three of us could spend most of our time together.

The house was set up like a typical casa chorizo with rooms all around a central patio.

Upstairs there was a tiny storage room that you could only get to through an exterior staircase.

The first thing we did was to tear down the walls that connected the two bedrooms in order to create a large living area.

We also removed the wall dividing the kitchen and the bathroom to create a larger kitchen.

A staircase was added inside the house and we moved the bathroom to the space below.

The sleeping areas were moved upstairs where we turned what used to be the storage space into our main room and built an additional room for Pedro using some of the space from the roof terrace.

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The patio is my favorite part of the house.

I love that it's the first thing you see when you enter.

The walls, the stairs, the doors and the gate are all original.

We did change the floors to these beautiful limestone tiles which are typical of traditional homes.

Since we use the patio a lot for meals we set up a ledge that works as a pass-through and for extra support.

We also closed off the space under the stairs so we can hide all of our cleaning supplies.

From the patio the living area can be accessed through two sets of doors.

In the entryway we designed a piece of furniture for shoes, coats and backpacks.

Since these things tend to get messy I decided to hide them behind doors.

The living and dining space is a large open room with high ceilings.

We removed the drop ceilings that were originally covering the vaulted brick which made the room feel much larger.

We kept the pine floors and the cedar doors but we did a lot of work to remove the plaster from the walls.

Against the window we placed a really big modular sofa that we had custom-made.

The best part is that we can rearrange it when needed.

The coffee table is something that I built myself in a woodworking class and the rocking chair used to belong to my mother-in-law.

We installed the tv on a swivel mount so we can watch from the sofa and from the dining table.

The dining table was something I made with repurposed materials from an exhibition a few years ago.

We eat, work and enjoy our hobbies on this table.

I thought about setting up a dedicated desk but I love being able to look out into the living room while I work.

Along the wall we added a sideboard where we store work-related items our computers and toys for Pedro.

On top of it I have my grandmother's old sewing machine that I still use to this day.

We designed the entryway cabinet to wrap around the corner and into the kitchen.

This helps transition between the two spaces and creates some extra storage.

We really enjoy cooking so we made sure to have a large countertop where we can do it.

To make this work we found a place for everything that usually ends up on the counter and created lots of storage space.

We also wanted the design of the kitchen to follow the green palette and natural materials of the patio.

We placed all the appliances along the pantry wall and added a large window.

It has completely changed this space bringing in a lot of light.

In front of the window we added a little bar that looks out at the patio.

This is where we have breakfast and it is such a treat because of the soft light in the morning.

The bathroom is hidden behind a door under the stairs.

We used a combination of black cement tiles and granite mosaics with pink speckles.

I liked the idea of changing the color in the space and making it a bit more fun.

For me, the staircase is definitely the star of the renovation.

We added hidden storage space in every nook and cranny as well as a huge open bookshelf.

It's not your typical use of a staircase but it solved a lot of our storage issues and really gives the space its identity.

We chose wood due to its warmth and for the upper section we used metal to let in a bit of light from the terrace.

The bedrooms are small but at the moment it is all we need.

We designed them as small cozy caves to contrast with the open living spaces.

We think the transition helps shift our energy before bedtime.

In our bedroom there is a wall-to-wall closet for our clothes and we added some hidden storage behind the bed for out-of-season stuff.

Where the old door used to be we created a large window that gives us lovely light throughout the day.

Pedro's room is the smallest in the house.

The space was so incredibly small that we decided to add a short door to give it some privacy without making it feel crowded.

We gave it just enough space for his bed and storage for his clothes.

We wanted Pedro's room to feel special so we printed this custom animal themed wall vinyl.

It was a way of making the space more playful.

For the floor we used leftover tiles from the kitchen.

He loves his room especially his Lego shelf and his little bookshelf.

We wanted his room to have access to a roof terrace so we decided to add a second door which we repurposed from the old storage room.

In a few years we plan to build him a new bedroom where the roof terrace is now and turn his room into a study.

When we decided to add the new indoor staircase we chose to keep the outdoor one as well.

We find it beautiful and visually striking.

It allows us to have two points of access to a rooftop.

If I had to define my philosophy it's simple.

The only rule is that there are no rules.

If we can let go of some preconceived ideas about how a kitchen, bedroom, bathroom or living room should look, any space can be transformed into a functional cosy place full of personality.

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