Small Hong Kong flat with a 600 sq ft terrace shows how to merge indoor and outdoor spaces
Clever details such as glass doors and internal windows have helped turn a poky flat into a light-filled apartment in which the spacious wraparound terrace becomes a natural extension of the interior
When Peggy Bels first visited this 450 sq ft apartment on Shelley Street, Central, she was underwhelmed. The flat, which she had been tasked with renovating, had been shoddily carved into two bedrooms, a living room and a poky kitchen, none of which capitalised on the striking city views and abundance of natural light. But one feature caught the French interior designer’s eye: the 600 sq ft wraparound terrace.
“The terrace is very important,” Bels says. “I wanted to make the terrace part of the flat, to treat it like an [extension of the] indoor area. I knew it could be special.”
So Bels set to work. She contacted the Buildings Department and found the flat had no internal structural walls, meaning she could reconfigure the space however she wanted. The owner, an expat for whom Bels had designed another apartment six years earlier, gave her “carte blanche”.
“I removed every wall,” Bels says. “We then started from scratch. Plumbing, electricity, walls, floor, windows – everything’s new. It was a full renovation.”
Merging the indoor and outdoor spaces meant fitting floor-to-ceiling glass doors that slide away to open the living room to the elements.
“The inside and outside are now like one place, the sofas [on the terrace] become like an extension of the inside,” Bels says. “It also makes the living room look much bigger.”