Like layers of sheer white clothing worn to reflect light, protect your skin from the harsh sun, and keep you cool, translucent cladding and metallic curtains create a diaphanous shield around a hot, flat, dingy building and give it a luminous appearance after dark. 314 Architecture Studio approached the renovation of an apartment building in Athens the way they do many of their projects, like their recent “House in Corfu,” adapting traditional Greek architectural sensibilities for the modern era without sacrificing any of the island nation?s classic, instantly recognizable style.

The existing building, which measures about 3,229 square feet and takes up almost all of its lot, resembles most of the other 1970s and 1980s-era structures surrounding it. It?s simple, highly rectilinear in shape, and lightly colored to avoid absorbing too much heat. There?s nothing particularly architecturally distinct about it. The clients commissioned 314 Architecture to redevelop all four levels of the rental, including a small walled-in garden on the ground floor, the two middle floors, and a penthouse master suite on the rooftop.
The architects call their vision for the renovation “H102 Romance Contemporaine,” or “contemporary romance,” an aesthetic that?s immediately identifiable thanks to the billowing curtains shielding the top floor from view and the sultry shadows that can be discerned from behind the translucent panels of the new facade. The exis...