Design getaway

In 2012, Pedro Domingos added new spaces featuring a minimalist design to the ruins of Casa Agostos, a haven of peace located in Portugal's Algarve countryside.

For the cold, a large lounge with a fireplace. For the heat, a 15-metre swimming pool in the middle of a natural reserve filled with olive trees and bushes. These are just some of the attractions.

From €290 per night, you can book Art Loft in Tuscany. It boasts its own sculpture garden, a large swimming pool and a small fishing pond. It is perfect for wine lovers as it is surrounded by several important regional wineries, including those in Montalcino and Montepulciano.

The owners repurposed this former clay pigeon factory into a holiday spot, and they themselves recommend visiting it in spring when it is peaceful and calm and the weather is mild.

Next to a 17th-century chapel and with just a dozen homes in the area, The Unterhus is a mountain refuge with a landscape filled with hayfields against a backdrop of the slopes of the Swiss Alps.

Peter Zumthor, winner of the 2009 Pritzker Prize (the ‘Nobel prize of architecture’) – is responsible for this reinterpretation of the traditional wooden homes of the area, to which he has added floor-to-ceiling windows. He has also designed much of the property’s furniture and the 7132 Therme & Spa Vals, located close to this mountain refuge with spectacular views of the valley.

This boutique flat in the heart of Venice started out as a workshop for design students. Today, it is home to experts and lovers of this art, with an interior created by local artisans, and everything you see is for sale - Image by Valentina Sommariva

It has three rooms with their own Turkish spas. It offers activities both outdoors – besides visiting Venice, don't miss some of the city’s finest delicacies in the Rialto market, just metres away – and indoors, where kitchen workshops and wine tastings are held or a private chef can be hired - Image by Valentina Sommariva

The Dutch MVRDV group – at the door of a natural reserve just a few kilometres from the coast of Suffolk – wanted to offer a nod to local barns made of metal with this 30-metre-long house (15 metres hang in the air) that features reflective steel tiles on the outside - Image from Jack Hobhouse

In addition to an interior designed for comfort and its four rooms with their own bathrooms, its huge windows offer a spectacular view of the forests and lagoons and allows the house to open on to the garden. The swing located at the house’s hanging end is one of the Balancing Barn’s most appealing features - Image from Living Architecture