Magy Upper Apartment Renovation

Built in 1936, Magy Apartment was a historical residential building on Wulumuqi Road in Shanghai. The client rented a small studio on the upper floor, eager to have “a comfortable interior that one would feel poised even being confined for a few months”. The architect designed the project in a special condition from March to May in 2022 when the city was locked down. A rented room and the demand for solitude are two important preconditions for this domestic interior design. A residence is often associated with the emphasis on private property, which tends to reflect the homeowner’s identity and status. While for a rented room, free from the burden of identity, the function could be simply returned to daily usage and inhabitation. The sense of solitude and seclusion evokes the typology of a monk’s cell, whose spatial organization is freed from social bonds such as family, blurring the boundary between public and private. Atelier tao+c aims to design a private room that promises its inhabitant the possibility of a life liberated from identity burdens and paradigmatic forms of family living. The original bathroom and kitchen were kept intact, while the bedroom’s partition wall was demolished to achieve a single open space. A new “cupboard” system was inserted to form several corners functioning as living room, bedroom, and dining area. Each space is independent yet continuous. The insertions, made of green-resistant MDF boards, evolve into bookshelves, desks, beds, closets, cabinets, platforms, and ceilings — a new interior formed through familiar and functional objects. To preserve the existing room and original teakwood floor, most components were fabricated off-site and assembled on-site. The cupboards were lifted by thin steel holders without touching the floor. These new objects are light and independent, not fully integrated into the memory of the original space yet not detached from it, creating a sense of separation that vacillates between stability and fragility. Two windows sit at the north and south ends at different heights. Desks were placed beside each window within the cupboard system. The large corner window in the south overlooks the urban landscape, while the high window on the north sits above an elevated platform, creating a relatively private nook. The originally narrow corridor is intentionally compressed by bookshelves on both sides and connects to a spacious terrace through a side door. As proposed by Karel Teige in Minimum Dwelling (1932), a minimal dwelling requires connection to public facilities. Located on Wulumuqi Road and adjacent to a lively neighborhood, the studio has easy access to shared facilities downstairs, allowing minimal domestic functions. This condition brings new interpretation to the relativity of public and private realms in a private room, enabling the imagination of a solitary life in a “cell” that remains part of the entirety of the metropolis.