Tiny Anne Tyng House Features Sink Of Questionable Utility

This snug midcentury modern abode, asking $615,000, was designed by Anne Tyng, a renowned visionary architect and long-time love of Philly's adopted native son Louis Kahn. Featuring three bedrooms and two baths, the 1,320 square-foot residence, featured in the New York Times, boasts a heap of bespoke amenities tucked into the home's tiny footprint. Such as a custom kitchen sink that has precisely zero tolerance for people who prefer to leave the dishes for the morning. Perfect for the petite dwelling —"a compact machine for living with everything shipshape," says Ingrid Schaffner (curator of the Institute of Contemporary Art and the home's current owner). Other aspects of the kitchen, however, have been thoughtfully updated by Schaffner, rendered necessary by Tyng's limited interest in food.

"She only ate nuts," says William Whitaker, the curator of the Architectural Archives at the University of Pennsylvania and a longtime friend of the architect's. Thus a "newly hospitable kitchen, with its Viking range, backsplash of bright yellow Heath Ceramics tiles, workable counter space, open shelves and a portable butcher block island," was designed and constructed by Schaffner's partner, architect Chris Taylor, whom Tyng had met, and liked.
Tyng's conversion of the original 18th-century row house is an ode to her dedication to space-frame architecture. "Working within the limitation of a 13-by-26-foot floor plan, tightly bounded by a miniature backyard and contiguous next-door neighbors, Tyng expanded the original house by opening up the interior spaces and building skyward." Up past the second floor's hidden Murphy beds, built-in shelves, and a free-standing storage unit that also functions as a room divider, the third floor "sleeping aerie," regally presiding over the street below, offers an expansive area to stretch one's legs. Under the pyramidal timber-framed ceiling, the space features a seating area, fireplace, four Juliet balconies, a loft bed, and 360-degree city views. "Tyng's architectural transformation beautifully displays her expansive ideas writ small," writes The New York Times. The home, albeit tiny, is a treasure.

· 2511 Waverly Street [Estately]
· Small Wonder [NYT]