This house outside Chișinău is built on one simple but powerful idea – space has been left inside the building for a living tree. It grows right inside the house, visible from the staircase through a tall floor-to-ceiling window. Not a potted plant in the corner, not a glassed-in winter garden – just a tree, with the whole space built around it.
From the outside, the house reads clearly: two distinct volumes, one stacked above the other. The ground floor is light-toned and feels grounded. The upper level is dark, with vertical wood slats that give it a sense of lightness and depth. Because of this contrast, the top floor seems to float rather than press down. The façade changes throughout the day – the shadows from the slats shift, so the house looks different in the morning than it does in the evening.
The exterior walls are clad with a ventilated façade system – not just a finish, but a system that protects the house from moisture and summer heat, keeps it from freezing in winter, and needs little upkeep. This kind of technology lasts for decades and suits Moldova’s climate well.
Inside, the house is split by how the family actually lives. The master bedroom, with its own walk-in closet and bathroom, sits on the ground floor – private, set apart from the rest of the house. Upstairs are three more bedrooms, a home office, and a terrace. The living room and kitchen are clearly separated. A two-car garage is built into the volume. All of this within the strict building rules of the neighborhood – and that constraint ended up producing a more precise, more interesting result than it would have without it.
