Jonathan Mizzi recently completed a penthouse, tucked away inside a huge building on an industrial estate overlooking a highway in Malta. The building's unusual location is a demarcation line between where the residential zone starts and the industrial area ends, but it is exactly this incongruity that drew Mizzi to the location.
The result is an unexpected, spacious open-plan penthouse within the former industrial building. This fifth floor penthouse has been designed to flow like a conventional apartment but without walls to demarcate individual spaces. The result is a series of different functional zones with their own respective energy while the overall design has a tranquil and calming aesthetic.
Inspired by Neo-Futurism, the penthouse has a warm bunker feel. Although industrial and raw, the space also feels contemporary and sophisticated. There are two main design features to the penthouse: the free-flowing Island and a curved bulkhead with a floating fireplace. There is a fluid dialogue between their composition within the apartment, each piece naturally leading your eye to the other, and back and forth in a circular motion.
The island seamlessly morphs out of the concrete floor, exposing a white resin flooring underside that accentuates its sense of motion. Meanwhile, the warmly back-lit curved bulkhead leads down to the integrated floating fireplace. Mizzi Studio left the original pre-stressed concrete roof planks exposed to form the ceiling which has hints of warm rust spotting throughout, creating an earthy warm deep and rich texture. The living room floor is split in line with the end of the curved bulkhead changing from micro concrete flooring to a walnut parquet floor.
The general lighting throughout the apartment utilises white surface-mounted track lights with industrial galvanised conduits adding to the futuristic feel. A combination of dramatic sculptural design and innovative lighting throughout the apartment, serves to create a warm, homely feeling within a futuristic open-plan space.
