A glass facade extension redraws the back of the house in one clear move: a two-storey addition that joins a former half-buried storage level to the main living floor. The new volume does not sit apart from the older house. It pulls the garden into view, opens the lower level to daylight and gives the existing plan room to adapt to changing ways of living and working.

Glass and garden meeting at the edge of the house

The most visible change is the glazed face of the extension. Slender black profiles frame large panes from floor to ceiling, so the boundary between inside and outside reads as a thin line rather than a heavy wall. Integrated window frames are set into the floor, ceiling and surrounding walls wherever possible. That detail keeps the opening visually quiet and lets the eye move straight through to the garden.

From the living spaces, the view runs across the glass and out into the greenery beyond. The extension takes over the rear elevation with a level of precision that makes the lines and corners align cleanly. It is a glass facade extension, but it is also a careful framing device: the garden becomes part of the room sequence, and the room sequence remains legible all the way back into the older house.

Daylight pulled down into the lower level

A void cuts through the added volume and brings more natural light into the heart of the plan. Instead of leaving the lower floor buried in shadow, the opening draws light downward toward the large kitchen-dining space. The effect is practical before it is atmospheric. Surfaces close to the void catch a different level of brightness, and the lower level gains a sense of depth that a flat ceiling could not provide.

This natural light void also helps organise the interior. It separates the added volume into readable parts without closing them off. The result is a clear route from the main living area to the kitchen below, with light marking the change in level. In a house that is already a century old, that kind of adjustment matters: it keeps the plan open to new routines without erasing its earlier structure.

Large windows house, but with the frame hidden in the detail

Seen from inside, the extension reads as a large windows house only if the details are looked at closely. The glass is not left to dominate the room by scale alone. The frames are absorbed into surrounding surfaces, so the opening feels drawn into the construction rather than applied to it. That restraint gives the interior a sharper edge and leaves the furniture, wall surfaces and light to do the visual work.

Dark profiles contrast with white wall planes and pale ceiling areas. The materials are few, but the joins matter. The window line meets the floor without a pronounced threshold, and that absence of a step makes the indoor-outdoor connection feel direct in everyday use. It is a precise way of working with glass: the opening is generous, yet the interior remains anchored by the structure around it.

An open stair zone with a glass balustrade

The vertical circulation area is treated as part of the living space rather than as a leftover corridor. A stairwell glass balustrade keeps the view open across levels, allowing the eye to pass through the house instead of stopping at the stair edge. Seen alongside the white stair run and the darker floor, the balustrade adds a clear, almost graphic line through the centre of the interior.

Light fittings reinforce that reading. Recessed spots sit in the ceiling, while wall and pendant lights mark the transition zones near the stairs and entry. Their small pools of light define the geometry of the room at night and sharpen the contrast between surfaces. The stair zone becomes a hinge between levels, framed by glass, light and the straight edge of the new construction.

Open sightlines across the living spaces

Glazed partitions and full-height openings keep the interior connected from one side to the other. Instead of breaking the floor into separate rooms with heavy dividers, the design preserves sightlines across the living area, the stair zone and the kitchen below. That makes the plan easy to read even when several functions overlap. A person standing in one part of the house can still follow the line of the window wall, the stair edge and the void in the centre.

The openness is not abstract. It is tied to specific elements: a white wall with a recessed niche, a dark floor plane, the reflective surface of the glass, and the straight upper edge of the addition. Together they define a space that feels measured rather than oversized. The extension gives the old house a new interior structure, but the construction remains visible at every point.

A structure built to hold its own edge

Because the glazed volume carries the weight of the facade above it, the supporting structure had to be sized with precision. That engineering task is visible in the alignment of the lines and the exact meeting of angles. Nothing sags or overhangs loosely. The upper edge sits firmly above the glazing, and the frame of the extension reads as a clear architectural shell.

This clarity is what allows the rest of the house to breathe. The former half-buried storage level is no longer isolated, and the main floor no longer ends at a hard back wall. Instead, the new construction bridges the old arrangement and a more open way of using the house. The glass facade extension does that work without heavy gestures, relying on proportion, light and a disciplined edge.

Materials kept to glass, brick and a few clear contrasts

Outside, the new glazed volume meets the existing red brick facade, which still carries the older part of the house. The contrast is direct: brick with deeper relief and repeated openings on one side, transparent glass with slim black framing on the other. In the images, the entry face remains restrained, letting the house appear as a sequence of solids and openings rather than a single, sealed object.

Inside, the palette stays quiet. White walls reflect the incoming light, while darker floors and frame profiles give the room edges. That combination lets the glazing stand out without turning it into spectacle. The architectural interest lies in how the extension opens the plan, how the integrated window frames disappear into the construction, and how the new daylight reach changes the lower kitchen level.

Photographer: Sebastian van Damme.