HOUSE, INKOO, FINLAND

Most finish families have some sort of bothy in the woods, and maybe a mooring for a boat at the lakeside. People can choose from simple, off-the-peg dwelling or apt for something more bespoke, involving an architect, as here in this holiday house in Inkoo, a small town west of Helsinki.

The site lies on the tip of a wooded promontory overlooking the coastal archipelago. Architects A-Piste reinterpret the rustic of rural traditions, so what looks like a simple cabin is actually a compact house with all mod cons, constructed quickly and economically from prefabricated elements.

Timber, naturally, predominates, with wall clad in skin of vertical cedar strips that will weather gracefully to silvery grey. A long rectangular plan swells up to a prow-like double-height volume at its north end, where the master bedroom is slotted into a mezzanine above the living room.

Both command natural light, large terraces and views of a typically Scandinavian tableau of rocks, pine trees and water. Ancillary functions such as stores, wcs and service rooms are tucked in along the west side, with a second bedroom and dining area linking the one-and two-storey volumes.

Generous decks, some open, some covered, extend the house’s capacity in summer, while floor-to-ceiling glazing enhances the visual and experiential connection with nature.

APRIL 2008

THE ARCHITECTURAL REVIEW

HOUSE, KRONBERG IM TAUNUS, GERMANY

When the authorities demanded a traditional German gable roof for a new family home in the leafy suburbs of Frankfurt, the architects returned the volley tongue-in-cheek. Though the roof’s gradient is conventional, its formal expression is far from ordinary, sparking off a sculptural architecture based on principles of positive-negative. The site is sloping orchard overlooking a valley and the architects wanted to retain something of this natural beauty. So instead of designing a solid building with traditional walls they divided the structure horizontally into three zones: the invisible ‘ground floor’ dug deep into the hill, the so-called ‘garden floor’ running as a visual extension of the orchard right through the building, and the floating ‘top floor’ on stilts above.

Each concrete floor slab can be interpreted as an extended topography of the rising ground contour, and as a result the garden and top floors are split level. Thus each slab is the negative imprint of the ground condition and the garden appears to run right through the house as all external ground-floor walls are made of glass. This allows uninterrupted views from and into the open plan living quarters of hall, kitchen, dining, and living area. Slender pilotis punctuate the tectonic of the structural frame, a device that echoes Corb’s villas. However, unlike the structure of classic Modernist houses, the weighty top floor is in stark contrast to the dematerialized ground floor.

Date: 2016-04-22; view: 941