What really caught our attention, though, was the new painter's studio in the rear garden. Built from Douglas fir with an exposed structure, the studio catches northern light through full-width roof lights and includes a kitchenette, WC and storage for canvases. Surrounded by new planting, an oval pool and mature trees, the space feels like a rural idyll despite its urban location. Muennig – an organic-architecture pioneer linked to Big Sur – built the redwood structure with radial trusswork, curved nautilus-shaped walls and sculptural skylights. A black cabin on a snowy slope(Image credit: Felix Michaud)Silver Heights, a sleek black cabin set into a drumlin slope in Ontario's Trent Hills, feels almost embedded in the land.