I just finished going through the work of Studio North. My friend Peter introduced me to them through this Globe article. 

They are a Calgary-based design-build practice that have completed a number of laneway houses, as well as bigger projects such as this 34 unit townhouse project in Canmore, Alberta.

What (not surprisingly) caught my attention was their focus on laneway/accessory dwellings. Pictured above is their Bowling Lane House in Crescent Heights, Calgary. 

It’s a 700 sf one-bedroom house that sits behind a 1920′s heritage house. Here is an axonometric of that relationship (the existing house was made transparent):

Here is an elevation from the main street. Look at how neatly it tucks behind the existing house. All you really notice is the garage of Bowling Lane House.

Here is how Bowling Lane House fits into its laneway.

And here are two images of the double height space that they managed to create within this 700 sf house.

Notwithstanding that this is a wider lot than what you might typically find in Toronto, it is precisely the kind of housing – both in terms of design quality and scale – that I was trying to create with Mackay Laneway House. It’s also where I was planning to move.

Kudos to the Studio North team for driving this initiative in Calgary. You can check out the rest of their projects here. They have a number of other laneway houses within their portfolio. And all of them are beautiful.

All images from Studio North.