House "D"

Photograph by Hisao Suzuki, courtesy of Sadar Vuga Architects.

Project details

• Project Name: House "D"
• Location of site: Velenje, Slovenia
• Year of commencement of project: 2003
• Year of completion of project: 2006
• Type: Housing
• Formula: Interlocking Fronts
• Site: Large site on a steep slope with panoramic views across the valley, Velenje, Slovenia
• Building area: 250 m²
• Total floor area: 341 m²
• Storey: Garage and storages + kids floor + living and pool and terrace + private floor with master bedroom
• Structure: Concrete plinth, concrete platform, brick + concrete walls, upper steel frame structure
• Cladding: Black colored bitumen tiles on steel supporting structure, colored and transparent glazing
• Architect: Sadar Vuga Arhitekti (Jurij Sadar, Bostjan Vuga, Miha Pesec, Adrian Petrucelli)

Photograph by Hisao Suzuki, courtesy of Sadar Vuga Architects.

Words from the architect

The House "D" is built into a very generic Slovenian semi-rural suburbia. It creates an ambiguous, soft relation to the typical double-pitched roof, not-too-big-windows and at-least-one-balcony houses in it's direct surroundings.

The steel framed upper storey of the residence houses the living-swimming-entertaining areas; suspended above the green painted, green covered concrete plinth.

Photograph by Hisao Suzuki, courtesy of Sadar Vuga Architects.

Approaching the site, the house rises above you and is perceived bottom-up. A very cinematic sequence underlines the house; especially when experienced from its immediate surroundings.

You can imagine the client's family enjoying sunbathing on a pool deck, high above the roofs of neighboring houses, with an Arcadian view to the hilly landscape of Slovenia.

On the topography of the steep ground, five construction strips with different cladding-fillers create four different exterior fronts of the House "D".

• An abstract front with strips, which closes the view towards the east;
• A Californian front, with a bold console of the ground house;
• A Provanse front, where the house opens towards the pool, terraces and green surroundings;
• The fourth front of the house is a local one and it creates the relationship between neighboring houses.

Photograph by Hisao Suzuki, courtesy of Sadar Vuga Architects.

These house fronts pass on from one to another through an interlocking mechanism. Where two fronts merge, they do so without loosing their own adjacent character, creating a cinematic sequential experience.

Photograph by Hisao Suzuki, courtesy of Sadar Vuga Architects.

The diversity of four house-fronts extends into recognizable micro-ambiences which give the house it's identity:

• The garage - camouflaged with the ground;
• The house entrance below the pool console;
• The reflected environment in the large reflecting-glazing front,
• Fluid living-room space - illuminated by notches between strips;
• The kitchen protruding towards the outside - dividing shade and sun terraces;
• And the bathroom and bedroom - joined by the terrace.

Photographs:

Photograph by Hisao Suzuki, courtesy of Sadar Vuga Architects.

Photograph by Hisao Suzuki, courtesy of Sadar Vuga Architects.

Photograph by Hisao Suzuki, courtesy of Sadar Vuga Architects.

Photograph by Hisao Suzuki, courtesy of Sadar Vuga Architects.

Credits

• Text, Courtesy of Sadar Vuga Architects
• Photographs by Hisao Suzuki, courtesy of Sadar Vuga Architects
• Compiled and Edited by Varun M Ajani