Soil apartment with a black box

We are in the attic of a residential building from the 1930s in Prague Libeň. In the 1990s, a duplex apartment was built into it. It offered more usable space and rooms than the owner needed, but it lacked the joy of the attic space. We were tasked with finding that joy.
We utilized the main quality of the attic, its height. The living room with a large library opens across two floors. In the center of the space, we insert a black box, the heart of the apartment, which conceals operational facilities, serves as a staircase with a bridge to the upper floor, and lets light into an otherwise dark hallway. This simplified the original layout without the need for major structural changes.
On the lower level of the duplex apartment is its social area. The living room and kitchen with an island form one open space. We placed a projection screen between the supporting columns in the middle of the layout. The kitchen with an island has storage spaces concealed in the black box. The upper level of the apartment is private. The bedroom and bathroom are connected by a black bridge across the open living area. From the bedroom, there is access to the rooftop terrace through French doors.
We reduce materials to the oiled veneer of the black box, oak laminate flooring, and terrazzo cladding in the kitchen and bathrooms. Other furniture is in a white shade, as are the wall paints. We reveal the wooden truss and the steel structure of the columns in the living room in their original raw form. Stark lighting lines emphasize the geometry of the space and highlight the glass chandeliers in the open area.
At the end of the project, changes occurred in the investor's personal life, which led to a request to reduce costs. In the individual details, we sought budget solutions to ensure they did not disrupt the overall impression. The bold concept of the design was successfully preserved.