The Uber-Trendy Home

Agnar Gunnar Agnarsson is not your typical guesthouse owner. Then again, Home isn't your typical guesthouse. Anyone who's ever stayed in a guesthouse in Iceland can attest to a relatively uniform idea in design: the IKEA furnishings, smallish quarters, common kitchen and bathrooms. There's certainly nothing wrong with these elements, but Agnarsson's guesthouse, Home, located in the heart of downtown Reykjavik, takes the concept a step further: recessed alcoves for beds nearly at floor level, floors partially inlaid with smooth, tiny stones, furniture you'd actually consider putting in your own apartment.

What inspired Agnarsson, a man trained in architecture, to take guesthouse design into this area?

"Drum and bass," he answers with a laugh. "To me, architecture and music go hand in hand. When you're working on a digital basis, you find rhythms in the wood finish, dowel rods are like high-hats. Like the music, it's always trying to innovate itself, and do something new, filling voids and working with the space you have."

Not that Agnarsson is some unapproachable conceptualist.

"There's no deep theory going on here," he says, "I'm just going for comfort here. I try to bring back that feeling of when you're a little kid, piling up furniture and blankets, making forts, or building snow houses. Some of my ideas have even come from Star Wars interiors. This is what this is supposed to be about: fun."

Fun is definitely a big selling point of this place, as is the location, but guests might forget they're in a guesthouse. Chances are they'll feel like they're in someone's home. Albeit someone with incredibly good taste.

By Paul F. Nikolov