House With a Hole / Lenka Míková architekti
House With a Hole / Lenka Míková architekti
Text description provided by the architects. House that observes, maybe mystifies. Nevertheless, it fulfills the wish of its owner to get a functional yet inspiring space despite a limited budget. And also the aim of the architects is to create a house with inner complexity, and outer simplicity, contemporary yet reflecting its vernacular context.
The project started as a reconstruction of an old house with a barn, but with a technical state that required its demolition. We kept the new house almost in the same place as the existing one, set on a slope under an access road and oriented against it to the south. Our primary aim was to reflect the local vernacular setting, which meant actually a longer proportion and bigger volume, although the brief and limited budget asked for less.
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The project resolves this by inserting empty spaces within the defined volume. The insulated interior extends to a covered terrace, an important part of the brief, under a single roof. The terrace opens up to the roof structure and through a large round opening in the gable wall which gives the house an abstract face, generosity, and intimacy.
The terrace continues along with the house as a covered doorstep, providing shading and a visual extension of the interior thanks to a long glazed wall. The interior stays restricted both in size and standards, but spatially rich thanks to views, reflections, and openings.
Layout and material solutions play with a concept of layering, each zone with distinct materiality, with an inserted room in the open ground floor with a fireplace and wooden floor, as the most intimate zone. The corridor along the glazed wall opens up to the edge of the attic and brings there an indirect light and a visual contact between the two floors. Despite the house seeming quite large from the outside, it stays relatively small and compact inside – which suits the owners, a family with two small kids that wish to spend time together and close to nature in their second home.