Looming above an industrial parcel near an abandoned railway terminal in Beirut, seven balconies jut out into the air like the hulls of stacked skeletal ships. ‘Plot #1282’ by DW5 Architects is one of the first major architectural projects to be erected in a depressed area beside military barracks, fallow agricultural land and a 100-foot-wide highway. It will add 95 industrial lofts to a local that’s currently non-residential, and since other buildings will likely spring up all around it in the coming years, those balconies are strategically focused on preservable views of the city.

A maximum of two apartments will be located on each floor, with the floor slabs arranged around nine exposed cores. Each living space features minimal interior partitioning and lots of glass.

“In its present state, the site enjoys unobstructed panoramic views on all orientations through the totality of the perimeter of the plot,” the architects explain. “As a result of that, all proposed loft spaces enjoy full transparency of their facades with openings that span from floor to ceiling on all exterior elevations. In an unforeseeable future, as the surrounding plots get built, and with the gradual densification of the immediate environment, the full apertures of our facades will face unpredictable situations that our project’s morphology responds to by its continuous setback on the totality of the perimeter of the site and the gradual recess of the floor plates.”

It’s a pretty clever way to make the building adaptable to changing conditions around it, and you have to admit, it has resulted in a kinda spooky but visually dynamic silhouette.

Add 160 square feet to your tiny, high-ceilinged apartment without consulting an architect or getting a permit thanks to DIY loft kits that fall somewhere between a renovation and the lofted beds you can snag at IKEA. A company called Expand Furniture makes the process of creating a mezzanine level as easy as installing a large piece of furniture, with models ranging from a bed platform to a entire extra room.

The three kits don’t come cheap, ranging from about $1,500 to over $4,000, but they’re still less pricey than permanent additions, and don’t require owning your apartment or getting your landlord’s permission to remodel. The DIY Loft Bed Kit has enough room for a mattress, nightstands and a bit of free floor space, and takes just four hours for two people to set up.

The modular Vancouver DIY Loft T8 Kit is height- and width-adjustable, and you can add on all sorts of accessories, like stairs of varying steepness, skylights and a variety of guard rails. The priciest kit, the New York DIY Loft T15, is large enough to be used as an entire elevated bedroom or office. All of the kits ship flat-pack from North American warehouses.

Expand Furniture also offers a range of impressive transforming items for compact spaces, including murphy beds, pop-up coffee tables and bookcases that flip around to reveal either a fold-down work surface or a mattress, all in one slim unit. The website is full of fun stuff for small-apartment-dwellers to fantasize about purchasing, if only they had $8,000 to drop on a king-sized bed hidden behind a sofa.

Customized to each particular interior, these wooden built-ins add lofted bedrooms, closet space, bookshelves, reading nooks, hidden laundry rooms and elevated workspaces in incredibly compact packages. Often performing like massively oversized furniture, custom timber creations can help make tiny apartments livable, taking full advantage of vertical space.

Bookcase Loft

A loft living room gets the addition of a library-style bookcase, closet, lofted wardrobe space, stairs and a small bedroom. Made of heartwood pine, the box insert measuring 16x17x10 takes full advantage of the ceiling height in the space.

Cabin in a Brooklyn Loft

A loft in Brooklyn gets a fun and functional new bedroom space reminiscent of a rustic cabin in the woods, creating a private room that also adds architectural interest to the space.

Garage to Studio Transformation

A garage in Moscow is now a studio space for an architecture student thanks to the addition of a bunch of built-in wooden elements, including a grid shelving system, work desk, sofa and suspended loft bed.

Sculptural Laser-Cut Shelving

Far more visually interesting than the average bookcase, this laser-cut built-in wall of shelves continues onto the ceiling in a single flowing form to become a sculptural focal point.

Multi-Level Artist Retreat

This artist-in-residence project at department store de Bijenkorf in Amsterdam fills the uniquely tall space of a historic tower with a beautiful series of stacked rooms decked out with cabinets, tables and bed platforms.

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Timber Transformations 13 Space Expanding Wood Interior Inserts

A formerly dark, poorly ventilated caviar warehouse is illuminated naturally thanks to a sunken courtyard with a retractible glass roof, connecting the interior spaces to an outdoor terrace, acting as both a space and a sort of floating lantern in the unit. Many of the historic details of the 1884 building in Manhattan’s Tribeca North have been preserved in the renovation, including weathered roof joists, antique windows and brick walls.

The converted loft by architect Andrew Franz occupies the top floor and roof of the old industrial building, reusing as many of the original materials as possible. The glass courtyard functions as a mid-level in the open-plan space, with a new staircase with reclaimed walnut roof joists as the treads and landing leading up to the transparent indoor/outdoor room.

When the retractible roof is open, fresh air flows freely into the living space. When closed, it functions as a 150-square-foot skylight during the day. An additional staircase provides access to a rooftop garden planted with native, low-water plant species.

New walnut cabinetry connects the modern elements of the loft to the historic, highlighting the building’s industrial past and simultaneously creating a space that feels warm and comfortable. Vivid orange in the kitchen backsplash and furniture add pops of color throughout the mostly-neutral space.

In the trash-ridden outskirts of Cairo, Egypt, precariously lofted structures rise up on stilts, home to birds that, come sunset, are set loose as the strange race begins to reroute and capture the free-flying flocks of one’s neighbors. The goal: to use flags and whistles to navigate your own birds and bring them back to their roost, all while hopefully entrapping your neighbors’ pets in the process.

Photographer Manuel Alvarez Diestro (via CityLab) flew in from London to document this bizarre phenomenon. Dating as far back as 4,000 years ago in various forms, this sport-like activity involves breeding, raising, releasing and recapturing huge collections of pigeons.

Garbage City, the informal name of the trash-collecting suburbs surrounding Cairo, plays host to many of participants, its lack of building code regular contributing to the unsteady-looking structures used to house the birds.

Not made to support heavy loads, many of these informal roosts are cobbled together from scraps and assembled like scaffolding from wood and whatever else is available.

PigeonNews gives a great deal of detail on everything from the types and ratings to behaviors of the birds and their masters, including stories of training, endurance and skill as well as sickness, predators and other mishaps.

Notably, pigeon is also eaten in the region, so while many treat it as a hobby or sport, some participants may also have other incentives for breeding (or catching) these birds.

There are as many as 2,000,000 people actively raising these birds in Egypt today, with some people spending hundreds of dollars a month on the upkeep of hundreds of birds.