See All The Industrial-Modern Details Of This Quezon City Home
A family's three-storey home showcases clever up-cycled, DIY, industrial-modern touches
Industrial designer and teacher Mitch Shivers loves to recycle and up-cycle. He owned the erstwhile recycling shop Make It Up in Podium, and a few months before he launches an exhibit, he calls out to friends to donate junk, broken electronics, old furniture, anything he could turn into art.
The same applies to his family home in Quezon City, which is done in a modern-industrial style, and is filled with up-cycled, DIY’ed details. “We didn’t want our house to be cliché—we wanted it to be unpretentious and different,” he says. Here are all the lovingly up-cycled details of that home.
READ: Recycled Pieces Fill A Modern-Industrial Three-Storey Home
Gate
Lots of up-cycled things are going on in the front gate: first, there is the main gate made out of weathered traviesas (old, wooden railroad ties). And then there is the you-can’t-miss-it house number, which is what Mitch calls one of his “mac n’ cheese” sculptures, made out of metal tube scraps.
CPU Mailbox
One of Mitch’s witty up-cycling touches: a mailbox by the gate that’s made out of an old Mac CPU—something to confuse mailmen who are new on the job.
Main Door
The house’s main door definitely shouts “industrial” loud and clear. Mitch couldn’t find an old bank door, so he built one himself out of metal sheets and rivets.
Railroad tie dining table
The industrial designer created their dining table—a wonderful play between rough-hewn wood and sleek glass—out of the same traviesa wood leftover from the main gate.
Living room
Most of the furniture in the living room (and some parts of the house) are hand-me-downs from wife Shelley’s family. The hollow block piece at right is one of Mitch’s tinkering experiments.
Music room
In a slight nod to Mitch’s hobby as a DJ (daughter Ellie is into music, too), the second-floor music/family room/work area is peppered with references, such as the big speakers used as side tables, and a roadie trunk repurposed as a coffee table. A stainless steel prep counter—salvaged from a fast food branch hit by Typhoon Ondoy—is reworked into a desk.
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