The quest to own a prime house in Bangkok leads to either buying or building, but not so many quality homes come up for sale, and suitable plots are scarce. There is, however, a ‘blue ocean’ solution. 

Despite the city’s ongoing transition from a low-rise townscape of 60 and more years ago towards an increasingly high-density metropolis dotted with condominium towers, there remains a vast supply of shophouses and townhouses, still the predominant type of building in every one of the city’s 50 districts, designed to serve almost any combination of small-scale retail, wholesale, production, administrative, professional and residential functions.   

If only the caveats could be overcome. In examples built in recent decades, these structures have been characterised by long, narrow rooms and inner spaces that lack natural light and ventilation. Corridors and stairways subtract from usable space. Most properties were constructed en masse during the 1970s–1990s and are ageing rapidly. Nature is nowhere in sight.

Enter design qua, an eco-forward modernist architectural studio co-founded in 2005 by Italian-Thai Malina Palasthira and her American partner in practice and in life, John Erskine. To add new office space for steady growth of their team and develop apartment units for rent, they and their business partner, architect Titinart ‘Tan’ Thumchuchaorat, bought a second pair of side-by-side five-storey shophouses in Bangkok’s bustling Phra Khanong District directly across from their existing office. The buildings stand at the end of a row of 11 shophouses in a T-shaped cul-de-sac of 21 identical properties developed in the early 1980s, when the neighbourhood was a mostly residential suburb. Today, it’s a prime urban location served by mass transit and every amenity.

The project serves as a case study in the high potential of adaptive reuse in a market where this concept has been slow to gain traction, despite its winning combination of sustainability, versatility and value.  Behind the two buildings’ little-altered facades, previously unwieldy rooms have been retrofitted and reconfigured to carve out three spacious, sumptuous apartments upstairs and a handsome, high-ceilinged office annex on the first two levels, all of it blessed with cross breezes and just the right influx of natural light. Dubbed ‘U67 dqua’, the residential section spans 267 square metres over three storeys. The office spans 125 square metres over two levels. Terraces are featured on every level, and each residential unit has at least two, affording tree-level views of foliage nearby.

‘We wanted to break the feeling of being in a shophouse that is long, dark and narrow,’ Palasthira says. ‘And our goal in every project is to minimise air conditioning and maximise passive cooling. So how do we do it? By opening things up, by creating cross ventilation.’

Transforming the spaces meant creating bigger volumes in both the horizontal and vertical dimensions. Out went the shared wall between the properties, doubling the width of the office and each living room to eight metres. A curved wall of glass bricks brought gentle light to the ground-floor office while retaining privacy.

More decisive was a solution drawn from the Unité d’Habitation, the pioneering series of social housing blocks designed in the 1950s by Le Corbusier, in which each apartment is built as a duplex on two levels, saving space by eliminating corridors. Similarly, design qua created two split-level units by cutting out sections of floor slab to open up atriums with space for private internal stairs linking the main and bedroom levels.  

For example, in one unit, a section of the floor slab between the third and fourth stories was removed to create a lofty, double-height ceiling. This atrium space accommodates a new internal staircase that rises from the living room to a second bedroom suite on the upper level. This bedroom is linked to its bathroom across the atrium via a new lightweight steel bridge, creating the ambience of a loft rather than a shophouse. The stairs are illuminated by natural light from the glass blocks set into the wall. That’s the unit dubbed ‘Bridge.’

For the other duplex, named ‘Spiral’, design qua put a sculptural twist on the Swiss architect’s concept by cutting a round opening into the fifth-storey living room floor to install a spiral staircase down to a single-bay bedroom suite on the fourth floor.

Optimising circulation was key. Instead of wasting floor space on common access stairs and corridors, the architects installed a compact lift and built a new column behind the building to house a stairwell. 

A ‘penthouse’ bungalow unit was built on the sixth floor, which used to be the building’s open rooftop. This top-floor abode, which has become a popular Airbnb rental, feels like a tiny single-family house, with its pitched roof and large terrace opening to the sky and townscape all around. 

Micro-pilings were added to support the new stairwell and the elevator shaft at the back. Steel braces shore up ageing cement columns and beams. 

The mid-century mood of the rooms chimes with the style of much-coveted vintage houses throughout the Sukhumvit Road neighbourhood. Stepping inside from Bangkok’s urban heat and glare, one is soothed by a muted palette of monotones, beige, putty, sea moss, rust, cream and other easy-going colours. Matte and softly glossy textures convey tactility: exposed concrete walls, reclaimed wooden doors and stair panels, bespoke steel railings, polished concrete floors, concrete ventilation blocks, glass blocks, glazed and unglazed tiles kilned in Thailand. The decor features potted plants, rattan seating, antiques, photos by Palasthira’s father, and paintings by Thai and regional artists. A vine climbs up the stairwell.

design qua views legacy buildings as a goldmine of opportunities throughout Southeast Asia. ‘Adaptive reuse means changing the function for today. It’s not just renovating,’ Palasthira observes. ‘And the fact that we can use what we already have makes it super sustainable.’