The concept of the "trophy garage" might seem tasteless, but it can be intoxicating in the right hands as these architectural wonders attest

Imagine building a full-size Scalextric track on top of a factory building. That’s essentially what Fiat did at their seminal Lingotto Factory (pictured, below) in Turin (1923). Cars would move up the building from floor to floor via a spiral assembly line as they went through the various stages of construction, finally emerging at rooftop level, where they were put through their paces on a high-speed test track.

More recently, Zaha Hadid has applied similar levels of inventiveness to an assembly plant more suited to the post-industrial age. Her BMW Central Building in Leipzig is perhaps the most efficacious building on the planet. The aim is for white- and blue-collar workers to coexist in blissful harmony, with everyone sharing the same social spaces and working towards common goals. As if to constantly remind them of this, the body shells of semi-finished Beemers glide quietly through the main building, along an intricate tangle of conveyor belts. While sitting at his desk, a worker need only glance upwards to see the fruits of his labour physically taking shape. And there’s no chance of him sneaking off for a well-deserved mental break with his frankfurter: there’s another conveyor in the canteen.

But what happens when architects have to design for the automobile at a domestic scale? The recently completed V House in Maastricht, by Wiel Arets Architects, was designed around the owner’s museum-quality car collection, which includes seven vintage Aston Martins. Arets explains, “The client requested that these cars be covered from the exterior elements, but did not explicitly state they must be indoors, which led to the house’s final design solution.” A void has been cut into the base of the building, allowing light to penetrate at the rear, and providing a canopy of concrete for the vehicles.

Fiat's Lingotto Factory included a Scalextric style high-speed test track on the roof of the building

Arets describes the neighbourhood as “currently gentrifying”, so security was paramount. The house is entered via a pair of oversized glass doors wide enough to accommodate the cars; rather than having conventional handles or keyholes, these can only be opened using an iPhone. For further privacy, the façade is fitted with a gradient pattern of dots, which, when viewed from a distance, look like curtains fluttering in the wind. At night, the sinuous silhouettes of the resting cars can be glimpsed through the glass.

There’s nothing quite like the heady whiff of petrol, polish and leather upholstery in a confined space. The concept of the "trophy garage" might seem tasteless, but it can be intoxicating in the right hands. The architect Seth Stein has expertly reimagined an unassuming terraced house in Notting Hill, with a 1960s Aston Martin as its showpiece. Rather than constrict the visitor through a narrow entrance hall, as is the convention, Stein has opened it out to the adjacent garage, allowing an infinitely more dramatic spatial experience.

The Glass Pavilion House in California, a Miesian edifice designed for himself and his family by Steve Hermann, has a dedicated “auto gallery” that accommodates up to 30 vehicles. “Gallery” is the right word: a Mercedes 300SL Roadster, a Porsche 991S and a Ferrari 246 Dino are among the motorised masterpieces that rest on a carefully buffed floor, gazing out through a curtain wall of glass. Hermann explains, “I am a fan of vintage automobiles, which are pieces of art, and the gallery treats them as such. Though I drive the cars as well, so everyone can enjoy seeing them on the street.”

House Unimog in Germany, designed by Fabian Evers, makes great play of a rather less glamorous form of vehicular transportation. It is designed around the client’s Unimog, an eccentric multi-purpose truck made by Mercedes-Benz. “The owner provides the neighbourhood with firewood,” Evers explains. “The Unimog he owns is his major tool to cut trees in the surrounding forest. In fact, the whole building was built around the Unimog. The living space above was almost not as important for him as the garage below. Large sliding doors enable him to use the whole space in an effective way, and the height of around 4m was driven by the lifting ramp he needs to be able to make repairs to the truck. The translucent façade fills up the space in a homogeneous way with natural light – electric light is only necessary at night.”

When designing new car storage for a client in Herdern, Switzerland, Peter Kunz divided the garage into a series of wonderfully sculptural vitrines. The client wanted more room for his collection, so he bought a precipitous sloping site beneath his house. Kunz devised five concrete cubes, each half buried, gazing into the distance. Four of them have glass fronts that serve as a light source and “shop window” for the space within. The fifth is the entrance, with a sliding gate inside it.

This garage is far more than a simple utility space, with a dark cast-concrete floor, irregularly spaced tubular lamps, and natural light penetrating the interior. The precisely placed cubes recall the work of Donald Judd, specifically his 15 untitled works in concrete in Marfa, Texas. Decorating their glass façades are inconspicuous inscriptions by the artist Oliver Kühn, verses dedicated to the age-old symbiosis between man and his automobile.

Fabian Evers designed House Unimog around the client’s Unimog, an eccentric multi-purpose truck made by Mercedes-Benz

The Glass Pavilion House in California was designed by the owner architect Steve Hermann, it features a dedicated “auto gallery” that accommodates up to 30 vehicles

The Glass Pavilion House in California was designed by the owner architect Steve Hermann, it features a dedicated “auto gallery” that accommodates up to 30 vehicles

> via The Telegraph