Hasta La Ideas

Ben Davidson of London studio Rodić Davidson Architects designed this garden shed in Cambridge, England, to the exact proportions of his grandfather’s old workbench and added pegboard walls for displaying a collection of handmade tools (+ slideshow).

The Garden Workshop is one of two wooden sheds that Rodić Davidson Architects has built at the end of Davidson’s garden. The other functions as a home office, but this one is used by the architect as a model-making workshop.

The building is designed around the size of two components. The first is a series of glazed panels the architect had been given for free by a contractor several years earlier, and the second is an old workbench originally belonging to his grandfather that he inherited after the recent death of his father.

“My grandfather was a carpenter by trade and extraordinarily talented; he should have been a cabinet maker,” said Davidson. “I recall many summers in my early teens, being packed off for two weeks to go and stay with my grandparents in Norfolk and spending the entire time with him in his workshop.”

“My father sadly died in 2012 and this led me to inherit my grandfather’s workbench and tools which had sat in the garage, unused and rusting, for almost 30 years since his death in 1985,” he added.

The building has a simple wooden box frame that is left exposed inside, fitting exactly around the old workbench.

The square recesses around the frame are infilled with pieces of lacquered pegboard that accommodate hooks for hanging the old tools, many of which Davidson says he made with his grandfather at the age of ten.

Modular wooden shelving boxes also slot into the recesses, while an extra workbench made from maple runs along one wall beneath a window.

Two skylights offer a view up to the sky through the canopy of an adjacent tree and a concrete base gives the shed its floor.

The exterior is clad with black-stained plywood over a layer of rubber waterproofing.

Photography is by the architect.

Here’s a project description from Rodić Davidson Architects:

Garden Studio, Cambridge

A black timber garden studio and model-making workshop

Hidden in amongst the trees at the end of a long garden in Cambridge, we have designed and built two separate timber-framed buildings for use as a home office/studio and a model-making workshop. The structures are clad in vertical black-stained softwood boarding of varying widths – wider on the studio and narrower on the workshop. On the studio, the cladding forms a continuous rainscreen and wraps the entire building. The larger studio building is very highly insulated (using 150mm Cellotex combined with Super Tri-Iso) and incorporates a super efficient air-source heat pump. Calculations indicate that the annual heating bill will cost less than £21 in electricity costs. The building is wrapped with a black timber rain screen over a complete wrapper of a rubber membrane for water-proofing.

Free glass

We moved to Cambridge in 2008 and, not long after having done so, I was offered – free of charge – some large Velfac glazed panels from a contractor that we were working with who had incorrectly ordered them for a new school. If I hadn’t have taken them, they would have gone in the skip.

The panels arrived at my new house in Cambridge on the same day that we moved in. For 4 years they sat in the garden under a blue tarpaulin.

Beautiful tools to restore and display

My father sadly died in 2012 and this led me to inherit my grandfather’s workbench and tools which had sat in his garage, unused and rusting, for almost 30 years since his death in 1985. My grandfather was a carpenter by trade and extraordinarily talented: he should have been a cabinet maker. I recall many summers, in my early teens, being packed off for two weeks to go and stay with my grandparents in Norfolk and spending the entire time with him in his workshop.

The two events – my father’s death and came together and led me to design and build the workshop. The design was led by numerous very specific criteria: The size of my grandfathers workbench, the size and number of glass units, the wish to not only store – but to display the wonderful tools (most of which my grandfather had made – indeed some we made together when I was 10).

The final briefing constraint was the wish to build the buildings under Permitted Development.

The design

The workshop is made using a timber frame on a concrete base. The frame is set out precisely so as to form internal square sections. The timber is cheap 6×2 softwood used for stud work. The frame was clad with ply (2 sheets on the roof) and then cross battened and clad again with staggered roofing battens (50x25mm). Internally, pegboard was cut and placed between the stud work squares and the entire internal space was then prepared and sprayed with 7 coats of Morrells satin lacquer. This was extremely time consuming. Birch ply cupboards were then fitted into the openings.

A workbench was made from maple accommodating a lower platform for the Meddings pillar drill and a sink. The elevation above the workbench is fully glazed and north facing.

Two roof lights were installed which look up into the canopy of the lime tree over.

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workbench and a collection of handmade tools appeared first on Dezeen.

by Heather Stewart Feldman Italian company Wood’d makes tech accessories and other objects from wood and leather, seamlessly blending modern aesthetics and processes with artisan woodworking skills and techniques. Determined to contribute to the future of…

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Per la nascita del suo figliolo, Jonathan G. ha costruito questi 36 blocchi alfabetici in legno dedicati a circa 134 personaggi o cose legate al nostro amato mondo nerd. Iniziamo bene.

Vienna design collective Mostlikely modelled this Alpine lodge on the wooden agricultural barns of surrounding mountain villages.

Mostlikely wanted to design a building that would be suited to a modern family lifestyle, but that also wouldn’t look out of place amongst the traditional architecture of its locality in Kitzbühel, Austria.

“This coherent architectural landscape allows for a romantic identity as well as regional authenticity and serves as the layer stone of the tourism industry in this area,” said the designers.

Rather than replicating the design of the local houses, they took the form of an old barn as the model for the house’s shape and appearance.

“The typology of the barn with its brick-built, massive socket that contrasts its open hayloft seemed to suit today’s needs better than the traditionally poor-lit farmers house of the old days,” added the designers.

Named The Barn, the three-storey house comprises a base of bare concrete rather than brickwork, and a wooden upper section with a gently sloping roof that helps prevent a large build-up of snow.

The architects collaborated with sculptor Stefan Buxbaum on the design of the concrete, using a corrosive chemical to engrave images of flowers and fishes into the surface to reference the “myths of the mountains”.

Living and dining rooms occupy the middle floor of the building and include double-height spaces with views up to the exposed wooden roof beams. A wood-burning stove sits between the kitchen and dining room, while glass doors lead out a large balcony terrace.

A metal staircase ascends to a top-floor mezzanine and descends to three bedrooms located on the ground floor.

Photography is by Mostlikely and Maik Perfahl.

Here’s a project description from Mostlikely:

The Barn – Edition Kitzbühel 2012. Living like a wild emperor. Staged Authenticity.

To build a one family house in the region of Kitzbühel architect Mark Neuner and the team of mostlikely took a better part of the design process as a research quest on how to build in a contemporary way without neglecting the historic traditions. Questions with great significance in an area where tradition not only weighs heavily on old houses but hardly any new houses that are more daring are to be found at all.

This coherent architectural landscape allows for a romantic identity as well as regional authenticity and serves as the layer stone of the tourism industry in this area. To respect and preserve the substance of the idyllic mountain village Going am Wilden Kaiser (the name of the mountain which literally translates to “Wild Emperor”) mostlikely chose to stage the well-known and proven in a new way.

The ideal model

Numerous walks through the environment and a deep dive into the history as well as the cliches associated with the area helped to analyse, measure and document the surroundings. These physical and mental excursions would then lead to a visualised outline of the plan that was full of variety and complexity. This way of “working in pictures” at the beginning of the design process enabled us to get a stronger connection with the space. This approach eventually led mostlikely to the barn instead of the traditional house to play the model for the further development. The typology of the barn with its brick-built, massive socket that contrasts its open hayloft seemed to suit today’s needs better than the traditionally poor-lit farmers house of the old days.

Concrete Flowers (or Fable and Flora)

The point of culmination for the idea of the barn was the socket. Instead of brick, concrete was the material of choice and the magic could take place: flowers and creatures that would slightly remind the myths of the mountains would grow – thanks to a corrosion technique – on the especially designed and each separately cast concrete panels. Moreover in an almost manic cooperation with the sculptor Stefan Buxbaum mostlikely was able to create panels of concrete almost as light as a feather so that even the automatic garage door would open and thus be integrated invisibly in the facade of the building.

Proven but progressive

In the living areas of the house especially designed furniture, walls made from exposed concrete and most prominently the wooden roof timbering that would dominate the shape and feel of the upper floors would connect the shapes of the past with modern living styles just naturally without insinuating.

Unpretentious and natural as a barn should be, a new typology of housing in the mountains was born: “Scheune Edition Kitzbühel 2012” its name.

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based on an agricultural barn appeared first on Dezeen.

Austrian studio Bernardo Bader Architects sourced pine and spruce from the surrounding slopes to build this picturesque chalet in a village of western Austria (+ slideshow).

Named Haus Fontanella, the house is built between the Glatthorn and Zafernhorn mountains in Fontanella – a village with historical ties to the nomadic Walser people that settled throughout the Alpine regions in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.

Bernardo Bader combined traditional and modern building techniques to build a house that resonates with the typical Walser buildings. A concrete base burrows down into the hillside, while the upper section comprises a pine frame clad with roughly-hewn spruce panels of random sizes.

“Our use of the wood was similar to how it would have been years ago – simple, first-hand and rough,” said Bader, explaining how the spruce was delivered from the sawmill and then installed on the walls in exactly the same condition.

Square windows also come in a variety of sizes and are dotted around the walls in a way that gives no clues about the internal layout.

“The intentional rough planking together with the randomness of smaller and bigger windows generate an exciting facade game and an intimate atmosphere inside, with selected framed views to the exterior,” said the architect.

There are three storeys inside the house, as well as an attic tucked beneath the sloping roof. Silver fir lines walls, floors and ceilings throughout the building, plus most of the fixtures are also made from wood.

The main living and dining areas can be found on the middle floor, opening out to a sheltered terrace, while three bedrooms and a study are located upstairs, and a sauna and storage area occupy the partially submerged basement floor.

A geothermal pump offers a sustainable heating source and extra warmth can be provided by a wood-burning stove.

Photography is by Archive Architects.

Here’s a project description from Bernardo Bader:

Haus Fontanella

Aim of the project: Not far away from the town centre of Fontanella – an old village of Walserpeople – the house is situated on a inclined south-terrace-plane. Not just to benefit from the great view but also to optimise the property’s borders, the building is placed on the upper part of the property and the volume is kept as compact as possible.

The whole facade of the building is a made of differently size sliced spruce boards, exactly how they are delivered from the sawmill.

The intentional rough planking together with the randomness of smaller and bigger windows generate an exciting facade game and an intimate atmosphere inside with selected framed views to the exterior.

The basement is made of concrete, the rest of the house is a whole wood construction. The interior work of the ground floor is also a silver-fir wood construction, the one in the upper floor is drywall.

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a chalet built from pine and spruce appeared first on Dezeen.