White building with various windows
Sited in Schlipsheim, a small and traditional village in the southern German state of Bavaria, the unconventionally shaped Haus Lux was designed by architect Manfred Lux for his own family.
(Image credit: Jens Weber)

Exterior of white buildilng

Refined and robust at the same time, the house takes its shape directly from its floor plan. Externally, the building seems to twist irregularly, but the architect's intention was to break away from the usual square shape and simply follow the most favourable volume for energy efficiency. 'A sphere is the best form in terms of volume, as there are very few surfaces where the energy is being lost,' says Lux

(Image credit: TBC)

All white exterior building

An all white oak timber exterior, complemented by a grass roof and floor-to-ceiling windows keeps the house cool during the warmer months...

(Image credit: TBC)

Gray wood floors with a navy sofa

... while flooding all the internal spaces with natural light and providing 'natural realistic pictures of an ever-changing landscape'

(Image credit: TBC)

fire place in an open space and a piano next to the staircase

The walls follow a design principle originally developed from stonemasons; the surface has been hammered using small stones collected from the rivers in the nearby Austrian Alps

(Image credit: TBC)

Piano in a large open plan room looking out to open gardens

The walls follow a design principle originally developed from stonemasons; the surface has been hammered using small stones collected from the rivers in the nearby Austrian Alps

(Image credit: TBC)

Piano next to white staircase

The stairs float above the living area

(Image credit: TBC)

Bed looking out into green space

One of the minimalist bedrooms

(Image credit: TBC)

bench in front of a large window frame

Large windows frame the views

(Image credit: TBC)

wood-panelled bathroom

One of the wood-panelled bathrooms

(Image credit: TBC)

Geometric tiling in the bathroom

Geometric tiling adds pattern to the space

(Image credit: TBC)

The exterior of the office, separated by a walkway

The exterior of the office, separated by a walkway

(Image credit: TBC)

The interior of the spacious office

The interior of the spacious office

(Image credit: TBC)

Ellie Stathaki is the Architecture & Environment Director at Wallpaper*. She trained as an architect at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece and studied architectural history at the Bartlett in London. Now an established journalist, she has been a member of the Wallpaper* team since 2006, visiting buildings across the globe and interviewing leading architects such as Tadao Ando and Rem Koolhaas. Ellie has also taken part in judging panels, moderated events, curated shows and contributed in books, such as The Contemporary House (Thames & Hudson, 2018), Glenn Sestig Architecture Diary (2020) and House London (2022).