In a 1940s terraced house in Madrid's Carabanchel neighborhood, architecture firm Extrarradio has created an innovative design that transforms a compact 68-square-meter space into a vibrant, flexible living environment. The renovation, dubbed "TET," showcases how thoughtful design can reflect the personality of its inhabitants—in this case, a young creative professional connected to the music world.
The architectural centerpiece of the home is a distinctive zigzag pattern that serves as the structural "backbone" of the ground floor, connecting interior and exterior spaces in a continuous flow. This mint-green painted line integrates the kitchen, bathroom, stairs, benches, and even an outdoor bathtub, creating a unified design that prevents fragmentation while adding character to the space.
"The owner knew from the start that the house should reflect his relaxed and creative lifestyle. A place made for meetings, dinners, and parties," explains Antonio Antequera, founder of Extrarradio. As part of a new generation of architects more focused on the 'how' rather than the 'how much,' Antequera aimed to create an honest home with the freshness of a good song with a catchy chorus—no special effects or coverings to hide the structure, just space, rhythm, and color.
The original two-story house, with its 20-square-meter courtyard, maintained its 1940s configuration: three small bedrooms upstairs, a living room, kitchen, and bathroom on the ground floor, plus a courtyard entirely covered with translucent polycarbonate. "We started by eliminating all non-essential elements from the house to reduce it to its fundamental structure: beams, load-bearing walls, and roof trusses," Antequera explains. From there, the team worked as if they had a blank musical score.
The new floor plan introduces the decisive zigzag element that articulates interior and exterior spaces. This continuous line unifies different functions while avoiding fragmentation and conferring character to the space. "The main challenge was integrating all the client's requirements within the restricted surface area of the dwelling," the architect acknowledges. "To avoid excessive partitioning, we chose to free up both the plan and the section as much as possible."
The design philosophy centers on creating hybrid, open spaces capable of adapting to multiple uses. The boxes housing different functions don't reach the ceiling, allowing for flexible environments that can change throughout the day—a living room that could transform into an impromptu recording studio, stairs that serve as seating, or a courtyard that transitions from intimate refuge to dance floor.
On the upper floor, the agency continues the logic of autonomous volumes. Two independent boxes house the bathroom and a secondary bedroom, also serving as separators between the main bedroom and an office. The result is a fluid floor plan, almost without corridors, where light and air circulate freely. A porthole window in the bathroom adds a distinctive architectural detail.
Color serves as a crucial structural element in Extrarradio's design approach. "Color is essential for clearly communicating the concept behind each project," Antequera states. In this house, green, applied in the zigzag pattern and on the boxes, marks the home's backbone. Its presence dialogues with the blue of the metal framework and staircase, creating a counterpoint that orders and accentuates the overall geometry.
The color choices aren't arbitrary—green connects the interior to the courtyard, extending the sensation of continuity, while blue provides a cooler, more technical touch. Materials are left in an almost raw state: continuous floors, metal joinery, and natural wood. Everything contributes to reinforcing the honest aesthetic that characterizes the agency's work.
"Working from a clear and powerful concept as the central axis of the project is one of our fundamental principles," adds Antequera. In TET, this concept materializes in a choreography of planes and colors that organizes daily life without imposing it rigidly. The home features artwork by artists Clara Cebrián, Carlos Aires, and Sonia Navarro, adding cultural depth to the living spaces.
Extrarradio transformed the previously covered and unused outdoor space into the social center of the house. Vegetation, the outdoor bathtub, and the same green that articulates the interior create original and fresh continuity. "My favorite part is the patio, with its bathtub surrounded by vegetation, an ideal place to spend the suffocating afternoons of Madrid's summer, with friends, around a dinner that extends into the early hours of the morning," Antequera confides.
The project demonstrates that design doesn't depend on scale but on concept clarity. With barely 68 square meters, the agency shows that TET is more than a "pretty" house—it's an exercise in domestic freedom. The home adapts to the rhythm of those who inhabit it, not the other way around, representing a small house in terms of area but large in terms of ideas and innovative architectural solutions.
