6 Tips for Designing a Minimalist House Exterior

6 Tips for Designing a Minimalist House Exterior

A minimalist home exterior creates a modern-unique style that will stand out from the rest of the neighborhood. A modern-minimalist exterior allows homeowners to simplify their surroundings, enhancing comfort and long-term peace of mind. Modern minimalist exterior house design provides unlimited creative style options for a home's exterior. An exterior minimalist design often features high-performing elements, clean-geometric horizontal and vertical lines, uniformity, depth, and visual interest with asymmetry and color. A minimalist home exterior aims to create a visually uncomplicated home.

Minimalist architecture materials and design always aim for functionality. All exterior elements should contribute towards comfort, a healthy indoor environment, and manageable short- and long-term costs through durability and energy efficiency. Read on for Fox Blocks six suggestions on materials for designing a minimalist house exterior.

1. Fox Blocks ICF Foundations

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Fox Blocks Insulated Concrete Form (ICF) foundations are a superior product (over poured concrete foundations) towards a minimalist home exterior design. Energy-efficient, durable, and healthy ICF foundations simplify a homeowner's life by contributing towards a comfortable and healthy home with lower long-term utility and maintenance costs:

  • ICF foundations (R-values greater than 20) provide more energy efficiency than poured concrete foundations (R-values of less than 3).

  • The forms protect the concrete with ICF foundations, making them less susceptible to leaking and cracking than poured concrete foundations.

  • Construction of cold-resistant ICF foundations can occur year-round, unlike cold-sensitive poured concrete.

  • ICF foundations provide double the compressive strength (resistance to shrinking), providing more protection from moisture than poured concrete foundations.

  • ICF foundations offer more protection against shifting in the ground and water pressure (which can cause cracking and leaking) than poured concrete foundations.

2. Simple Roof Design for a Minimalist House

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The clean lines of a simple, low-pitched roof create long-horizontal planes, similar to the broad horizon line found in nature. A low-pitched roof for a minimalist house design reduces building and long-term costs.

  • Flat or low-slope roofs keep building costs down because they require fewer materials than steep-slope roofs.

  • The ease of access to flat and low-slope roofs makes upkeep and maintenance simpler and safer than steep-slope roofs.

  • Low-sloped roofs with less attic space improve the efficiency of the heating and cooling systems, lower energy use and keep the home comfortable during extreme temperatures.

3. Uniform Facade with Few Windows

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A modern minimalist house exterior should project uniformity, with no clutter, intricate doors, or colorful window dressings. Standard features of many minimalist-style homes include flat and monochromatic facades with few small windows, not interrupting the continuous flow of the façade. In addition, stucco or continuous concrete cladding further creates a structure that looks like a single uniform block.

4. Geometric Shapes for a Minimalistic House Exterior

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Today's minimalist home exterior design often includes geometric shapes, volumes, and lines, along with different materials, like stone, brick, or stucco, to create textures. Adding clean-bold geometric lines and simple-natural textures produces visual interest for a home's exterior without unnecessary exaggerated embellishments or frills.

5. Asymmetric Design for a Minimalist House Exterior

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This minimalist home exterior design features asymmetrical exteriors and elements of color to create depth and visual interest. Throughout the 20th century, architects have experimented with minimalist exterior house designs influenced by the Dutch artist Mondrian. In his minimalist, geometric paintings, he often used horizontal and vertical lines for defining space, adding elements of color to rectangles and squares. In addition, his paintings emphasized asymmetry, reaching compositional harmony through a balance of shape and color.

6. Minimalist House Exterior Colors

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The minimalist exterior design depends on simple, neutral colors. For a minimalist small house exterior, elegant white cladding can add volume. However, for a contemporary, modern feel, try contrasting the warm white with bold black, deep red, or steel-grey window and door trims. If you want to warm a home’s exterior by giving it the charm of a comfortable country house, consider a solid-muted color, like tan or light grey, for the siding, applying soft gray-brown accent colors to the doors, trim, windows, or garage.

How Fox Blocks ICF Can Help You Design Your Minimalist House Exterior

Modern minimalist exterior house design strives to produce visually uncomplicated homes, providing comfort and peace of mind for years to come. Visual components like clean-geometric horizontal and vertical lines, uniformity, depth, asymmetry, and color all contribute towards a minimalist house exterior. However, high-quality functional elements, like the foundation, are also vital to creating a minimalistic, low-stress home. For a minimalist house exterior, high-performing, durable, energy-efficient, and healthy Fox Blocks ICF foundations contribute significantly towards a comfortable house with manageable long-term costs.

Contact Fox Block professionals today for professional advice on designing a minimalist house exterior.