Barker Architecture Office (BAAO) is an award-winning practice based in New York, whose projects range from architecture to interiors and landscape across different typologies – including townhouses, residential developments and educational projects. Here are two interior design projects they recently completed using U.S. hardwoods.
White oak provides a thread line for this Upper West Side flat extension in New York
This brownstone apartment, just a stone’s throw away from Central Park, serves as a second residence for a family.
Originally split into two flats, only connected at garden level, Barker Architecture Office (BAAO) sought to blur the boundary between the two units while creating private suites at different levels, enabling visitors to come and go independently.
The living room centres around a working fireplace, while white oak shelving surrounds the street-facing windows. The white oak stairs connecting the three front levels were resurfaced and screened.
Adjacent to the living room is the informal dining area where white oak has been specified both for the bench seat embedded in the wall and the elegant wooden panelling behind, made up of thin vertical slats. A black-stained wood table contrasts with the white oak chairs. White oak reappears in the kitchen, where the oak island is surfaced in a terrazzo slab.
The deep blue-grey bedroom walls of the primary suite are brightened by a white oak slat headboard and integrated nightstands. The oak slats continue in the bathroom, where soapstone, terrazzo, and white porcelain penny tile provide a mix of colour, pattern, and texture.
White oak features again in the staircase that leads down to the second family room on the lower level towards the rear.
Bespoke walnut furniture blends in with richly veined marble in this Brooklyn townhouse
Barker Architecture Office (BAAO) were also invited to redesign a townhouse in Boerum Hill, Brooklyn, for a social family of three to maximise spaces for entertaining and accommodating visitors.
American black walnut blends into the curvy interior design through different elements of bespoke furniture. In the parlour, a curved sofa and armchair frame two marble coffee tables resting on a curvy rug. One of the two has a solid walnut base, which contrasts with the richly veined white marble tabletops. A bespoke walnut sideboard echoes the coffee tables and anchors the corner of the room. The design of the sideboard is both chunky and curvy with fluted columns supporting a thick rectangular tabletop.
A deep fluted plaster archway frames the view towards the kitchen and the large steel window wall that spans right across the rear. A curved pantry cabinet flanks a solid white oak dining table and chubby upholstered chairs.
The rebuilt stairway leads to a light-filled media room which is painted in a deep aubergine flanked by a marbled bar area. A bespoke chubby and curvy walnut coffee table sits in front of a sectional sofa.
On the second floor, the primary suite features soft lavender-grey walls with stained oak elements. Two bespoke hanging nightstands in walnut add a touch of class of their own.
A home office with a custom tambour white oak desk is set against walls painted in a deep forest green, lit by custom LED sconces.
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Photography credit: Gieves Anderson
