Arquidoll

When looked upon close, people’s bodies are slightly disturbing…

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Bates Masi Architects have designed a single family residence in Southampton, New York.

From the architects

The waterfront site of an existing 1970’s kit house overlooks layers of wetlands to an estuary, the bay, and the ocean. The client set the parameters of keeping the existing structure while doubling the size of the house with an addition. The existing structure consists of glulam post and beam construction connected with steel plates. One solution could be to mimic the existing architectural language of the post and beam skeletal structure in the addition. Since the existing house clearly expressed the structural system, the addition should also express this. The architect chose to clearly identify the existing system of the house and create a dialogue with a contrasting panelized system in the addition. The new system utilizes prefabricated elements that resolve multiple structural and spatial problems. Examining the strategy of a kit of parts, current material fabrication technologies are utilized to expand on this idea. A different approach to sustainability is explored, minimizing waste by simplifying to the essential components in order to resolve multiple problems, thus eliminating typical construction waste. Using a standard as a precedent and developing a new structural system paired with the latest technologies, a material can accomplish multiple tasks and heighten the experience of inhabiting the space.

Prefabricated shear wall panels, used in light frame construction in areas that are hurricane prone with high force winds, were studied. Most are made from a light gauge metal folded to add strength and rigidity. For our case the panels were to be exposed and used for more than just a hidden structural component. A standard light gauge 4×8 steel sheet was folded back and forth along the long axis adding the same strength and rigidity to the panel. The resulting 2’ panel locks into adjacent panels and is a structural shear and bearing assembly, as well as a decorative furniture component.

The new structural panels multitask throughout the addition. The solid steel transitions to a perforated panel that baffles the sunlight over windows and doors. The light quality varies throughout the day as light levels transition through the overlapped perforations. Fins that protrude from the wall panels are laser cut to accept shelving, seating and countertops. The same perforated steel becomes the dining room chandelier, and the platform for the stair and desk. This one material is exhausted in its possible uses throughout the house, minimizing the necessity for additional components that require wasteful shipping and packaging. The secondary infill material is used through both structures, on the floors, walls and ceilings to unify the old and the new.

Using new technologies to fabricate customized panels from a standard product accomplishes several things: less material is necessary to achieve greater structural strength, multiple programs can be integrated into one material, waste is minimized resulting in a more effective approach to sustainability, and the dialogue between the existing and new structural systems elevates the experience of inhabiting the space.

Architect: Bates Masi Architects
Landscape Design: Bates Masi Architects

Photography by Bates Masi Architects

lilyserpent:

“If animals could speak, the dog would be a blundering outspoken fellow; but the cat would have the rare grace of never saying a word too much.” ― Mark Twain

Singapore-based architects FARM have designed the Wall House.

From the architects

This is a tale of two houses – similar looking, yet independent and coming together to form a coherent whole. The two blocks sit on a sprawling piece of land, belonging respectively to the retired parents and one of their children.

This separation of the house into two blocks, in part a response to the sheer scale of the land, is also a requirement brief given by the clients. Programmatically, it consists of a two-storey block with the main living and master bedroom area, and a single-storey block housing the entertainment areas of the house.

What links these two volumes together is the huge central courtyard at the entrance expressed in an austere geometry of granite floor and wall, an organically shaped oculus and a minimalist planting of six willowy trees. Like a sparse yet artful Chinese landscape painting, this sets the tone for the rest of the spaces.

The landscape design, similar to the house, is also experienced in multiple correlated layers. It takes its inspiration from the philosophy of classical Chinese Garden where views are borrowed through cutouts and vistas, and where sight lines and spaces begin to overlap.

Architects: FARM
Photographer: Bryan van der Beek and Edward Hendricks