What we mean by luxury — and what we don't
Luxury, in the way the word is usually deployed, is a signalling problem. Gold leaf, marble pillars, a designer logo on the sofa, a chandelier loud enough to be heard. Most of our clients are past that. They have lived with the loud version and want the quiet one. What they look for is not display but substance: a kitchen that holds up to twenty years of cooking, a library that stays cool in August, a bathroom that ages without becoming dated.
This is the version of luxury we work in. Material substance over surface effect. Custom-made over branded. Time spent on a single doorway detail rather than budget spent on a logo. It is a slower, more demanding practice than decoration, and it produces results that read as understated to the casual visitor and as considered to anyone who looks closely. Where a client wants this material direction documented before any construction, we offer it as a standalone Mood & Material Concept.
The argument for material substance
A house lasts longer than a fashion cycle. Materials should too. We specify substances that age — solid timbers rather than veneers, blackened steel rather than coated aluminium, terrazzo and natural stone rather than printed surfaces, hand-glazed brick and mouth-blown glass where they earn their place, brass and bronze for fittings that will develop a patina rather than wear through a finish. These materials are more expensive at the moment of installation and considerably cheaper across the life of a building. They also look better in year twenty than in year one, which is the test that matters.
Custom-made over designer brands
We work with a small network of joinery, metal, stone and glass workshops in Germany. For most of the elements that define a room — the kitchen block, the wardrobe, the bookshelves, the bathroom vanity, the bed — custom-made is both better and, beyond a certain quality threshold, comparable in price to high-end branded furniture. The difference is fit: the cabinet that meets the cornice exactly, the bench seat that holds the bay window, the shelves cut to the dimensions of the books they will carry. We use designer pieces where they are genuinely the best answer — Cassina, Vitra, Time & Style, selected vintage — and avoid them where they are decoration.
Restraint as a discipline
Restraint is harder than abundance. It requires editing. It requires saying no to the second pendant lamp, the third stone, the fourth wood species. It requires holding a palette across a thousand square metres without becoming monotonous. This is the work. The rooms that look effortless took the longest to draw.
Reference projects
A selection: PENTHOUSE D150 — 150 m², Best of Interior 2023. VILLA A4 — a denkmalgeschütztes Einzelkulturdenkmal in Wiesbaden, Generalsanierung. HAUS D7 — two Altbauten joined near Mainz, Best of Interior. THE COLLECTORS APARTMENT — a 130 m² Altbau apartment in Wiesbaden, designed around a private collection. VILLA L14 — 530 m² residential.
For projects where the emphasis is on structural renovation and heritage coordination see Villa Renovation. For high-end apartments and penthouses rather than houses, see our apartment design page. For broader context on our private residential work see Residential — Privates Wohnen.
HOAI phases and pricing
We work along the HOAI framework — phases 1 through 9. For high-end residential work we typically cover phases 1–8, including site supervision. Early concept and material work is billed on a day-rate basis; defined scopes are priced per phase. The HOAI is a reference, not a ceiling. What determines the fee is the depth of the design intervention and the number of trades on site. Concrete figures follow the first conversation.
