Sunglasses manufacturer Shwood is known for their classic designs made out of not-so-classic materials like the one hidden in their name. Adding to their trademark wood frames, the Portland, OR-based brand takes a leap forward today with Stone, a new line made from a thin veneer of slate over…
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Applied perfectly to this ultra-contemporary garden setting, Peter Donders’ creative seating designs, the C Bench and Stone, instantly command a strong visual attraction. Each uses a single strand of carbon fiber twisted around a mold. When the mold is removed the resulting structure is organic and airy in aesthetic yet incredibly strong. They’re a surprising solution for both indoor/outdoor seating and exceptional for defining a variety of modern spaces.
Designer: Peter Donders
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(Carbon Fiber Stone was originally posted on Yanko Design)
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This house in Toronto by Drew Mandel Architects features pale grey stone walls and an overhanging top storey (+ slideshow).
Home to a family of four, the two-storey residence sits at the edge of Cedarvale Park, a steeply sloping ravine surrounded by woodland.
Drew Mandel Architects used locally quarried stone blocks in three different sizes to create irregular courses on the building’s exterior. To contrast, zinc clads the cantilevered first floor and richly coloured walnut covers a selection of surfaces inside the house.
“The restrained and limited material palette avoids unnecessary ornamentation in order to focus one’s attention on the site, natural light, and movement through modulated open spaces,” say the architects.
The volume of the house is broken down into modules, which step back and forth on both floors to create two patios at ground floor level and a vegetable garden on the roof.
The architects explain this as a “pushing and pulling” that mediates between the residential context at the front and the woodland area at the rear. “The sculptural expression solves programmatic requirements, maximises views, provides natural light, and enhances the promenade and transition from suburban streetscape to very primal forms of nature,” they add.
A glazed single-storey block at the back contains the living room and offers a view back towards the park.
The overhanging first floor cantilevers out beside it and hovers above an outdoor swimming pool. To support the weight of the cantilever, the architects added a single concrete wall and a series of concealed trusses.
A double-height dining room is positioned at the centre of the house and splits the first floor into two wings. A mezzanine corridor runs between.
Other Canadian houses completed in recent years a house built with concrete bricks in Québec and a timber-clad house on a hillside.
See more architecture in Canada »
Here’s some more information from Drew Mandel Architects:
Cedarvale Ravine House
Toronto, Canada
The Cedarvale Ravine House is a 3350 square feet home for a family of four that is located at the edge of the Toronto Cedarvale Ravine. The ravine system, the most distinctive feature of Toronto’s geography, comprises of extraordinary arteries that flow through the city giving unique access to the wilderness. This infill house sits on a typical mid-town residential neighborhood street, but opens to protected woodlands at the rear of the property. The building mass is formed by pushing and pulling the desired volume across the site. It is further manipulated with void spaces. The sculptural expression solves programmatic requirements, maximises views, provides natural light, and enhances the promenade and transition from suburban streetscape to very primal forms of nature.
The circulation of the house weaves through a modulation of intimate and expansive spaces and courtyards that lead to a glass-enclosed single-storey space at the rear of the property. This is the kitchen and family room, the heart of the house. It also defines the south edge of the courtyard. This volume has been pushed down to one storey in order to permit light to the interior and views out to the ravine. Large expanses of glass dematerialise the monolithic stone building and dissolve boundaries between the interior and exterior.
The building is clad in custom local Ontario stone masonry units. 2″, 3″ and 4″ tall stone courses are laid in an irregular sequence. The random lengths of stone range from 1′-0″ to 4′-0″ and intend to emphasise the horizontal lines of the building.
Above: site plan – click for larger image
At the second floor, a zinc-clad cantilevered superstructure frames views from the inside and gestures to the woodlands. It floats above and beyond the main stone volume and allows the re-naturalised ravine plantings to be brought farther into the site. A lap pool reflects light into the space under the second floor cantilever where a family can enjoy outdoor activities around the pool and barbeque.
Above: ground floor plan
The reaching superstructure is the structural feature of the project. Its one storey high trusses are embedded in walls and are supported on an exposed slender column. Column supports are reduced by diffusing the overturning forces into both the roof and floor diaphragms. A series of space-defining vertical planes and a mass concrete wall are used for lateral resistance. The floating rear volume is complimented by a carport cantilever reaching to the front property line. Its structure is a three-point steel framing system with wood infill, sitting on cantilevered concrete walls.
Above: first floor plan
The private areas located on the second floor feature operable floor-to-ceiling glazing with sliding interior wooden shutters. The system allows one to control sunlight, privacy, air flow, and noise as desired.
Above: long section one – click for larger image
The second floor diverges into two wings separated by a double height dining space and its adjacent open courtyard. This connection space is traversed by a bridge that leads to access to a green roof.
Above: long section two – click for larger image
It contains a vegetable garden for family meals, while insulating the one-storey family room-kitchen below. Both the courtyard and the green roof spaces support the local conservation authority’s interest to have the rear of the property re-naturalised as part of a larger ravine stewardship program. With much of the rear planted, these green spaces provide additional amenity space and more complex and modulated volumes. The ravine is brought to the foreground at the second floor spaces.
Above: elevation – click for larger image
The restrained and limited material palette of stone, walnut, and concrete avoids unnecessary ornamentation in order to focus one’s attention on the site, natural light, and movement through modulated open spaces. The Cedarvale Ravine House provides opportunities to celebrate the everyday rituals of residential life and enhances the slow unfolding experience of a special site.
The post Cedarvale Ravine House
by Drew Mandel Architects appeared first on Dezeen.
Vietnamese studio Vo Trong Nghia Architects has hidden a bamboo-framed conference centre behind a fortified stone wall in the countryside outside Hanoi (+ slideshow).
The 80-metre-long wall may look like a historic structure, but the architects actually constructed it as part of the project. “In north Vietnam, there is a tradition to make rustic stone walls,” Vo Trong Nghia told Dezeen. “I wanted to make the wall become a part of the beautiful landscape.”
Built using dry stone, the wall curves gently around the edge of the building, shielding the interior from the road and protecting it from the noise of a restaurant across the street. “I wanted to design a quiet space for the new conference hall,” said the architect.
New earth mounds rise up around the edges of the wall but a tunnel-like entrance leads inside, where a reception lobby directs visitors into the largest of two conference halls.
Once inside, the bamboo framework is revealed as a row of trusses that follow the curve of the facade to supporting the asymmetric roof above.
The architects deliberately specified locally sourced bamboo for the structure. “In southern Vietnam, we often use ‘Tam Vong’ bamboo, which is bendable and suitable to create a curving figure, but this is not very available in north Vietnam, so we used ‘Luong’ bamboo, which is more common,” Nghia explained.
Describing the difficulties the architects encountered with this material, he added: “This bamboo has a big diameter and is difficult to bend. Our challenge was to create a pliable form by using this hard and straight bamboo. So the frames of the roof had to change their shape gradually.”
Grey brick walls line the interior and while pendant lights hang down from the ceiling to sit level with the eaves.
The Dailai Conference Hall forms part of the Flamingo Dailai resort, a holiday retreat surrounded by woodland at the foot of the Tam Dao Mountain in northern Vietnam.
Vo Trong Nghia Architects frequently use bamboo for their buildings and recently came up with a concept for low-cost modular homes built using the material.
The architects also picked up two awards at the 2012 World Architecture Festival, where we interviewed Vo Trong Nghia about his plans to reduce the energy crisis in both residential and public buildings. See all our stories about Vo Trong Nghia Architects.
Photography is by Hiroyuki Oki.
Here’s some more informataion from Vo Trong Nghia Architects:
Dailai Conference Hall
A residential resort, named Flamingo Dailai Resort, was planned and partly constructed for busy city citizens to enjoy their weekends surrounded by nature. It is located in the middle of flourishing forests between Dailai Lake and surrounding mountains, about 50 km away from Hanoi. The guests of this resort can enjoy the beautiful landscape inlayed with numerous natural objects, plants and flowers and escape from their daily life in cramped quarters.
The lot of Dailai Conference Hall is located beside the main access road, which is used as an entrance for the whole resort; the building welcomes all visitors when they come. To enhance their expectation for a delightful stay in the resort, an impressive curved stone wall along the road was designed as its “receptionist”. The wall, which is 80-meters long, 8-meters high and 1-meter thick, offers a sequential view to visitors, revealing and screening the surrounding nature from place to place. Furthermore, the curved wall works as a device, which raises the morale of visitors and attempts to lure them to events being performed in the hall. An orthogonal access between artificial hills conducts visitors through the stone wall, then, visitors reach a foyer covered by a dynamic bamboo structure with an extraordinary scale.
The wide-span structure of the conference hall consists of the composition of straight bamboos. Bamboo itself has many advantages, such as beautiful color, texture and reproduction potential. Many bamboos are assembled into a structural frame, which has higher reliability and redundancy than bamboo used individually. Its maximum span is 13.6 meters and the positions of the joints at each frame are adjusted to make a generous curve of the roof. Though the functional requirements as a conference center divide the space into specific rooms such as a main hall, sub hall, foyer and supporting rooms, the dynamic bamboo structure enables visitors to feel the spaces are wider and more open, showing its continuity through a transom window above the partitions.
Bamboo and stone are abundant natural resources near the area. The hall achieves its originality and special atmosphere by using these local materials in plenty. Consequently, the building becomes a friendly accompaniment to nature. The aim of this building is not only to supply a nice space for events but also to deepen the experience of the generous spirit of nature.
Architect Firm: Vo Trong Nghia Architects
Principal architects: Vo Trong Nghia, Takashi Niwa
Contractor: Hong Hac Dai Lai JSC + Wind and Water House JSC
Status: Built in 08. 2012
Program: Conference Hall
Location: Vinhphuc, Vietnam
GFA: 730m2
Client: Hong Hac Dai Lai JSC
Above: floor plan – click above for larger image
Above: cross section – click above for larger image
Above: front elevation – click above for larger image
Above: rear elevation – click above for larger image
The post Dailai Conference Hall by
Vo Trong Nghia Architects appeared first on Dezeen.
Stone Gate est une réalisation du designer italien Raffaello Galiotto présentée pour la première fois par Lithos Design à la 100% Gravity Exhibition, à Verone en Italie. Avec une forme de cercle, cette structure pesant 5 quintaux est à découvrir avec différentes images dans la suite de l’article.
Hackney studio Gort Scott used locally quarried stone for the rugged grey walls of this house on the Isle of Man, UK (+ slideshow).
Located in the grounds of a country house, the two-storey building is split into two apartments that include a guesthouse on the top floor and a residence for an au pair on the ground floor.
Grey slate covers the roof, which pitches upwards to create an asymmetric gable at one end of the house.
“One of the building’s primary successes in our view is its presence in the wider landscape,” architect Jay Gort told Dezeen. “The striking silhouette rises from the high point of the site and shares a relationship with some of the other figures that punctuate the horizon.”
Gort also explained how guests staying in the top floor apartment will spend most of their time at the main house, so a concrete staircase and balcony provide a route over the stone wall that separates the two buildings.
This staircase, which features stainless steel balustrades, is the only entrance to the upper floor, so the small garden and driveway belong exclusively to the ground floor residence.
As well as using regional materials, the architects also specified traditional construction methods that would suit the local contractors. “We decided to tailor details to suit their expertise and skills,” said Gort.
Other rural houses we’ve featured include a slate-clad house in Wales and a renovated farm building in the south of England.
Photography is by David Grandorge.
Here’s some more information from Gort Scott:
Isle of Man House
Isle of Man House is the first stand-alone new building for London-based architecture practice Gort Scott. The building is a part of a privately owned estate, made up of a collection of buildings and gardens, in a dramatic windswept rural setting.
Gort Scott produced a strategic plan for this estate in 2008, and the house and its garage represents the first of three proposed new buildings. A new swimming pool house, also designed by Gort Scott, is currently on site.
Site plan – click above for larger image
Set on the rocky Scarlett peninsular, on the island’s South coast, the cottage is built from local Castle Town Stone. The cottage covers two floors and contains two separate apartments each 80m2 in floor area. Emerging from the Castle Town Stone perimeter wall, the building’s cuboid form tapers up into an asymmetric Welsh slate roof pitch that leans into the Irish Sea winds. The building stands at the high point of the site and is intended to sit as a figure in the landscape; the profile of the roof was considered from a number of surrounding vantage points.
Ground floor plan – click above for larger image and key
The client requested two discrete apartments, one for guests and another for an au pair; this required the cottage to have differing relationships to the main house and to the estate as a whole. The upper floor guest apartment residents would spend time at the estate’s main house, so Gort Scott’s design provides an entrance through a walled garden to the rear of the building, connected directly to the main house along a stone path. A drive leading into the estate arrives at the door of the ground floor au pair apartment, allowing a degree of separation from both the main house and upper guest apartment. Locating the stairs to the guest apartment into the estate’s walled garden means the house’s modest garden and parking area can be used exclusively, and privately, by the ground floor residents.
First floor plan – click above for larger image and key
Inside, both apartments have a simple open-plan layout of living and kitchen areas leading onto two double bedrooms and a bathroom. The upper apartment is entered using the external staircase, leading into the kitchen, then into a double height living and dining area. This space is naturally lit by a skylight and by a floor to ceiling window, which opens onto a generous seaward-facing steel balcony. The ground floor apartment is entered through the living and kitchen area that has aspects across neighbouring fields, the estate grounds and towards the sea. Glass entrance doors that lead onto a patio area are sheltered by the upper apartment’s balcony.
Section – click above for larger image
The thick external walls of the house have a blockwork cavity wall construction with an outer face of 250 millimeter thick Castle Town Stone. The stone was quarried from Pooil Vaaish, a few miles from the site. These walls support a beam and block floor and a timber and steel roof structure. The dark colour and the roughness of the traditionally laid stonework are contrasted by the crisp pre-cast concrete window and door surrounds that emphasise the composition of windows on the four sides of the building.
Elevation one – click above for larger image
There are essentially three parts to the form of the building, the main body of the house that is abutted by a table-like terrace to the front and an external stair to the rear. The terrace and stair are constructed in slender, exposed in-situ concrete, with stainless steel balustrades, and were conceived as large pieces of external furniture.
Elevation two – click above for larger image
Structurally these two elements are independent of the estate’s main house, but are ‘pressed’ into the house’s external wall so that the concrete supports are flush with the face of the stonework and appear as concrete ‘veins’ in the surface of the stone walls. This detail is repeated for the wind post in the garage building. The tone and finish of the in-situ concrete was chosen to marry with the pre-cast window surrounds.
Elevation three – click above for larger image
Professional Services
Contractor: Nick Ingam
Quantity Surveyor: Berrie, Millar & Cox
Structural Engineer: Structural Engineering Services Ltd
Stonemason: Dennis Quayle
Elevation four – click above for larger image
Materials / Suppliers
Precast concrete: Lancashire Precast & Brick
Windows: Veka
Roof: Natural Welsh Slate
Castletown Stone: Pooil Vaaish Quarry
The post Isle of Man House
by Gort Scott appeared first on Dezeen.
Warm pine and cold granite conjure man’s relationship with nature
The new pine and granite Geo Table from Portuguese product designer Gonçalo Campos makes a bold design statement with the raw materials. By leaving the underside of the slab tabletop unfinished, Campos aims to remind the user where the individual components come from, while juxtaposing the cold top finish…
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A electronically controlled stone wall slides across the facade of this house in Warwickshire, England, to conceal a large window.
Designed by British architects Baynes & Co, Wickstead Lodge replaces a traditional vernacular house that formerly occupied the site.
The moving wall was created to overcome a planning requirement stating that the new house should have only small windows, like its predecessor.
Narrow gaps in the stonework let light pass through the wall into the dining room behind.
The whole of this lower floor was also set just below ground level so that the two-storey house wouldn’t be taller than permitted.
We also recently featured a house in Bath constructed from a similar pale stone – take a look here.
Photography is by Stuart Whipps.
The text below is a description from Adrian Baynes:
The project was a new house to replace an existing one.
The planning authority imposed considerable constraints in terms of massing, roof height, materials & design.
They wanted a replacement single storey house, with small windows, of traditional construction.
The client wanted a two storey, contemporary house.
The solution was to sink the building into the ground and create three gables so as to minimise the impact from the road.
However from the rear it is a substantial two storey development.
The biggest difficulty was the planners requirement for small windows to match those in the original house.
The answer was to install the largest double glazed window available and then construct a steel framed stone wall in front of it.
The stone was bonded in place so as to allow the light to penetrate through the joints.
However the entire wall was mounted on an geared electric motor powered track to allow it to move like a giant curtain.
By careful engineering the wall was mounted without any top support.
The building was constructed with stone gables & a matching brick, with terne coated stainless steel roof with roll batten joints to replicate a traditional lead roof.
En capturant des monuments et des bâtiments de l’ancienne Yougoslavie, Jan Kempenaers arrive à nous inviter dans un univers mystérieux et passionnant. Des clichés d’architecture et de structures construites à l’ère communiste, réunis sous le nom de “Spomenik”.
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Milan 2010: British architect John Pawson exhibited a pavilion made of stone in Milan last month. (more…)
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