Courtyard No. 9

From the street it is a brick wall with one door. Behind it, every room faces a planted court that holds the afternoon sun.

The site in Copenhagen set the terms before we drew anything. The street is busy and north-facing. Privacy and light pulled in opposite directions until the court settled both.

Living rooms take the ground floor around the court. Bedrooms sit above under a pitched roof.

We worked from a 1:50 model for most of the design stage and kept it on site through construction. Where the model and the drawings disagreed, the model usually won.