House W at R
This site is in an agricultural area. In terms of volume, scale and shape, the plan provides for an archetypal farmyard typology as a stepping-stone towards optimum contemporary integration. The existing farm building is converted into a home, while the two outbuildings are replaced and used as a pool house and as storage space for garden tools.
The buildings will be given a warm look and feel by the bricks, rugged reddish-brown crafted masonry and roofing tiles with a weathered appearance. Large wooden windows in afrormosia, amply proportioned and cleverly directed towards the surroundings, will lend the buildings a contemporary character.
The plateau will be an element that binds the three buildings. The positioning of the buildings in a U-shape and their construction in the same materials will be instrumental in helping the plateau to resemble a ‘farmyard/courtyard’. The three buildings present themselves as a strongly defined single entity, highlighting the contrast between the built-up and the countryside. All physical relationships with the surrounding countryside will be makeable only via the courtyard. The garden will be laid as a ‘sunken lawn’ in the plateau. This approach will allow make the plateau a point of reference that sets the scale of the buildings in the open countryside.
The furnishing of the surroundings will be confined to planting astutely spaced poplar trees around the buildings. This almost compelling intervention will be another valorisation of the contrasting co-existence of the artificial and the natural.
The new dwelling will have a surface area of 228 m² and the volume of 1195 m³
