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Competition: win a book exploring home extensions, renovations and refurbishments
Dezeen is giving away five copies of Upgrade: Home Extensions, Alterations and Refurbishments, a book exploring architectural and design concepts that repurpose and reinforce existing structures.
Through extensions, refurbishments or complete rebuilds, Gestalten's book showcases how architecture can be recycled and celebrated – with each home revealing their original history.
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"It is these buildings that are particularly fascinating in today's reuse-recycle-reduce culture," said architectural writer and lecturer, Tim Abrahams in the introduction to Upgrade.
"And yet, we often hear that we live in a time that has no respect for the past: that ours is an era that disregards the architectural qualities of previous eras in an often flagrant way," he continued.
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The homes illustrated in Upgrade contest this idea, demonstrating architecture firms' increasing attention to the opportunities and creative possibilities provided by existing structures.
"One might say we are living in a golden era, where architects are responding to a broad change in attitude toward our built history," writes Abrahams.
"We are realising that domestic buildings are as much a part of our heritage as palaces or museums," he continued.
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The book maps out the relationships between new and old materials, providing images of the projects before and after construction while creating a visual guide to the multiple architectural interventions across the globe.
In Asdfg Arkitekten's conversion of a 19th-century miller's house in Berlin into a modern family home, the architects removed most of the partition walls to provide interconnected rooms separated only by an original brick wall at the centre of the house.
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Also featured, is London-based Fraher Architects' simple extension to a dilapidated early 19th-century house in Lambeth, which had been unoccupied for ten years. The modest interventions included a sloping glass roof, creating a bright new dining area that opens onto a garden patio.
Another dovecote adaptation by Portuguese studio AZO Sequeira Arquitectos Associados, shows the relationship between stone and wood in the reimagined building, which was converted into a garden playroom with a shower area for the client's nearby swimming pool.
![Ibiza Campo by Standard Studio & Ibiza Interiors](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2017/02/ibiza-campo-standard-studio-and-ibiza-interiors-residential-houses-interiors-spain_dezeen_sq-852x852.jpg)
Amsterdam-based Standard Studio transformed a 200-year-old stable into an off-grid showroom and guesthouse for the owners of an interior design shop in Ibiza. Authentic cedar wood beams and ancient stone walls complement the local materials, including concrete and chalk-plastering, used by the studio for the renovation.
Gestalten publishes visual books, with a particular focus on graphic design; architecture; visual culture; design & fashion; escapism; food & beverages; travel, and contemporary art.
Upgrade: Home Extensions, Alterations and Refurbishments was released earlier this year in May 2017, and is available to purchase online for £40 ($50).
All images are courtesy of Gestalten.