In hot climates, the unrelenting sun beats straight down onto building facades, making it a lot harder for them to keep their interiors cool. Shades of various kinds can help, of course, but there’s a different way of dealing with heat that comes with additional benefits. A new home in Vietnam by VTN Architects features a second facade set about eight feet from its actual exterior walls, creating a cool, shady breezeway in between that supports an abundance of trees and other plants.

“The semi-exterior space connects the interior and the terrace part of the garden, and is a place to promote various living activities,” the firm explains. “It is a multipurpose space which serves as a connection between each space. It is a place for gardening, sightseeing, sitting, [and] walking, and it also connects to the living space. These distinctive spaces offer residents options in their daily lives, like whether to dine inside or outside on a particular day. The various movements in the resident’s lives are also conveyed to the neighborhood through [the] windows in the exterior facade.” Between the wrap-around terraces and all the plants on the rooftop, the architects have planted more greenery than construction of the home displaced, though of course, public green spaces have a lot more value to the community at large. VTN Architects took inspiration from stones found in the nearby UNESCO World Heritage Site Ha Long Bay for the rough exposed conc...