KARAWITZ, Marly-House, passiv-house, 2014. Installation view at Palazzo Mora, 2016.

After architectural studies in Vienna and a few years of practice with internationally renowned studios (Roland Rainer, Vienna, Massimiliano Fuksas, Paris), Paris based design-studio KARAWITZ was launched in 2006 by Milena KARAnesheva and Mischa WITZmann.
From the beginning, KARAWITZ is engaged in essential architectural issues and understands construction as responsible working within and for the benefit of society. Within a holistic perspective, the design-process is conceived as a function of exterior and interior influences on the design-object. In a pragmatic approach, KARAWITZ’s intention is to convert the existing constraints into advantages.
KARAWITZ’s architecture is free of any ideological or dogmatic restrictions, is tailored to the requirements of users, and is sensitive to the existing environment. “Function” is understood in its broadest sense, including concepts such as “beauty” or “security”, or perceptions such as “density” or “lightness”.
Environmental considerations play a key role in KARAWITZ’s projects. “Eco-friendly architecture” is not misinterpreted as a stylistic concept, but should be seen as the logical consequence of a responsible attitude to natural resources and the respectful treatment of one’s surroundings and the environment.
KARAWITZ employs all currently available technical resources and methods with a view to achieving maximum “utility” in the sense described above with minimum expenditure and the least possible damage to the environment.
With its widely acclaimed "Bamboo-house" in the suburbs of Paris, KARAWITZ sets an example of sustainable architecture in which usefulness, simplicity, and pragmatism combine to form a poetic unit. Built in solid timber-construction, the small house is the first architect-designed certified passive-house building in France.
“The conceptual idea may be quite simple. I also do not see that everything has to be new. People often tell me: “We already know what you are telling us”. My only response to that is: good. I want what’s right, not what’s new. If something is absolutely right, it will also be new in a certain sense, as no brief, nor the method for its execution, is exactly identical to the last one.”
— Roland Rainer, Austrian Architect, 1910–2004