Holiday Refuge - Pyrenees

[decipher]

Project - University Second Year Project
Location - Estany Long, Pyrenees (see map below)
Type of Project - Holiday Refuge
Tools/Programs

Plans in Autocad 2005 / 2006
3d Model in Sketchup
Rendering in Autodesk Viz
Layouts Photoshop CS

Design Parameters -

The Refuge is to be located on an area of flat ground to the east of Estany Llong.
There are two main very strict site constraints however, firstly the building may not exceed 6 metres in height above the ground at any point and secondly, the building must be visible to assist location but still be in sympathy with the surroundings.

The Refuge is to house 2 self-catering apartments plus a communal sleeping area with kitchen and sanitary facilities for 20 people. In addition, there is to be accommodation provided for a full-time warden. The two self catering units are to be 3 bedroom apartments at 50m2 each, all accessed from a communal entrance/reception lobby area. The apartments are to be fully serviced to a reasonable standard but should be identical in layout, to keep costs down and make maximum use of prefabrication.

Your solution should be in keeping with the spirit of the park but above all be buildable.


Design Approach -

I wanted to create a contemporary building that would be striking on the horizon but also fit with the landscape over time. The major design generators were the lake, and sustainable construction. All of the living rooms have been angled to face down the water, to the south west and the building is stepped to provide privacy and mutual shadding for the large areas of glass. The main structure is of paired glulam beams, which arch over the bays and appear to 'lean' on each other. The roof is sedum matting and the walls are of corten cladding which will weather over time, helping the building to blend with the landscape more.

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North / South Elevations

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East / West Elevations

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Ground Floor Plan

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First Floor Plan

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A little more context.. a view down the lake from the site. I only had a few photos like this to go on, as i am based in the UK.

[decipher]

Cheers guys,

looking forward to having this project ripped apart ;)

I can post a skippy or i might be able to render some interior views if they are needed.

[dhaa]

Firstly, the site recalled some beautiful memories I have from last summer. I spent an icredible week with my girlfriend in the National Park of Aigüestortes and Estany de Sant Maurici. We didn't actually pass along Estany Llong, somehow we avoided it, but I can imagine what the scenery is like there. This part of the Pyrenees is extremly rich on water. There are hundreds of amazing lakes, creeks waterfalls etc. Really worth visiting. Another thing is that especially in the summer some parts of the park are very crowded especially the surroundings of lower lying refuges. some of them have gravel access roads from the villages in the valleys and the tourists can even access them by park's official offroad taxis which turns these parts of the park in kind of a theme park. I think that this is also the case of the western part of Estany Llong (estany means "mountain lake" in catalan, llong means surprisingly "long").

Now about your design. It seems you forgot to post the section. It is quite important to understand how the two levels and also the structural system work.

Now a few things that I find questionable:
What about the required number of beds (20)? I can see only 18 and that's supposedly including the warden's apartment. It seems to me that you've made the building much bigger than needed in these conditions. There's a lot of waste space or probably too much of the common space. I've visited some of these refuges and they usually work as a place where you sleep above all. Everything is minimized. Even if it's intended for a longer stay I think that people usually go there because of the surrounding nature and they spend most of the stay outside making trips. Making the two level common spaces also needs more heating. Believe me - even the summer night temperatures can sink below zero there.

The form seems to me ok in plan. The units could be easily assembled like this - they could even be prefabricated as entire pieces - but I don't understand why you introduced that curvy partition. I think once we talk about prefabrication, we should follow this concept through until details. It would be quite nice to see the building disassembled into the prefabricated parts that one would bring to the site by a helicopter or something. Just to justify that you had counted on it.

Now what about snow? It looks that the roof forms some kind of depressions - a trap for the snow.

So to summarize I'm not satisfied with what I see. It is maybe that this is the case when the strong architectural presence of the building is the last thing to consider. Not the first one.

Probably there should be another driving idea derived from the surroundings, from the tectonics of the mountains, from the local materials or anything else or it should all be radically based on the possibilities of prefabrication.

Sorry to be the first one and straight a bad guy. I'm expecting another interesting discussion here. Probably you haven't said everything or I have misunderstood something and you will make me change my mind in the end;)

edit: a kmz attached: note the amount of lakes in the surrounding area.

[Marr]

I'm not totally convinced by this design either. I'm having a hard time seeing what generated these forms, which are quite expressive. They don't seem to be inspired by the surrounding mountains or generated by some spatial or functional concept. That, a concept is what I think the design is mostly lacking, or at least you did not explain what the essence of the general idea is.
I also agree with Dhaa that there seems to be alot of wasted space judging from the plans.
I think a much more functional, compact, minimal approach would be more convincing for a project like thins. Or, If you want to make expressive forms, which is fine, there has to be some idea behind it. Otherwise it risks being seen as meaningless play with forms. Just my opinion of course, and of course there could be something you are not telling us about the process that might change my mind. :cheers:
The drawing material on the other hand is very good for a second year student. :clap:

[2kemon]

Hi Decipher

It certainly looks like an amazing site you got there. From the material you presented, I guess it's kinda hard to comment much on how the building matches its surrounding.

Non-the-less, I actually like he consistency between your ground floor plan and your elevations and your drawings look very nice!

I was wondering if perhaps, you could show us an aerial perspective? Maybe just a very quick and rough photomontage of how the building relates directly to the water?

[_C3]

I pretty much agree with the two first critiques. However the shape is really interesting, it reminds me of a refuge I designed for Scotland when studying sustainable design there, but the scheme didn't win basically because of all the problems said before.
Actually I like the "shell" of the building but I think that the inside space is not well managed, resulting in space wasting (thus in energy wasting).
Besides where do those colors come from? Is that grass on the roof? And seems like there's a lot of glass on the side. Maybe a site plan would help.
Basically I think it needs more work, but that's a good start for a second year student.

[decipher]

dhaa

Thanks for the critique,

You have had the luck of actually being in the area, something i did not get. Personally i think it was a poor brief, but i wont make excuses :) To be honest, i thought if anything i had made the building too small! Where would you say space is wasted? Perhaps the double height living areas, but im a sucker for a tall space.

The beds issue, there are 10 bunkbeds in the communal area to the north of the building and three bedrooms in each apartment plus the warden. So actually 27 occupants of the building in all. I read that the communal sleeping area would likly be for groups of people that would only be staying one night and so the upstairs is quite compact.

The roof is actually designed to trap the snow, to further increase the insulation of the building in colder weather. The building was 'over engineered' to compensate for the possible increased load in this situation.


Marr

The form of the bays is not inspired directly by the location, the design process did start taking the mountains into account for the bay forms, they were pointed arches, which for practicality and personal choice evolved into the final shape.

I have been 'design starved' this year on the course, with a huge emphasis on structural principles and theory and only two design projects. Perhaps i over designed the building because of this...


2kemon

Ill post a plan :)


_C3

Yes, the roof is sedum matting and the walls are corten cladding, hence the orange colour. However it is hoped that this will weather considerably, dulling down to fit the landscape more closley.

[decipher]

Not very good im afraid,

But the google earth coverage is poor aswell so the OS style map is clearer

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And a section, the image size here is really a restriction if detail is needed...