Brooklyn architecture studio PRO has overhauled a townhouse in Williamsburg, adding a slanted glass volume on its top-level to double the home's living space.

Peterson Rich Office (PRO) redesigned a 4,000-square-foot (371-square-metre) property in the trendy Brooklyn neighbourhood to create the family residence called Prismatic Bay Townhouse.
PRO tore tearing down a large portion of the existing property but "kept just enough to consider the project a renovation rather than a re-build". The new portion is built with a wooden structure to copy the original building and nod to the local architecture of the neighbourhood.

The studio's main intervention was to recreate the front wall, using Manganese ironspot bricks and mahogany window frames for the lower level, and weather-steel and glass for the top two stories. It is placed at a slant that is "tilted towards the sky".
"The townhouses revives a historic construction technique that is unique to this neighbourhood in New York City, but updates it with design features and details that reinterpret the townhouse typology," said PRO.
"These textured, refined materials at once relate the building to adjacent brick structures, and set it apart with contemporary detailing."
Photograph by Nicole Franzen
At the rear, the studio extended the property with a steel volume topped with a large skylight to bring in plenty of natural light inside.
"The steel structure on top allowed us to create...