01
Courtyard House
- Place
- Location, Country
- Year
- 2024
- Area
- 380 m²
- Programme
- Family house
- Structure
- Board-formed concrete, charred larch
STUDIO NAME — City / City — Est. 2012
Buildings that belong to the land.
Houses, chapels and quiet civic rooms in concrete, timber and stone. Drawn slowly, built to last generations.
Fig. 01 — Slope House, Location, 2020
- Passive House certified
- Certified sustainable timber
- Fixed-fee design stage
The practice
We begin with the slope, the light and the trees. The building comes last.
We are an independent architecture studio making homes, chapels and small civic buildings that are quiet from the road and generous from within, and that grow more beautiful as the weather works on them.
- i
Site first
Weeks on the land before the first line is drawn.
- ii
Honest materials
Concrete, timber and stone, left to age in the open.
- iii
Built to be repaired
Every junction detailed so it can be mended, not replaced.
Fig. 02 — Slope House, from the lower path
Selected work
Four buildings, one idea.
01020304
02
Pine Room House
- Place
- Location, Country
- Year
- 2023
- Area
- 290 m²
- Programme
- Family house
- Structure
- Concrete shell, oak joinery
03
Coastal Villa
- Place
- Location, Country
- Year
- 2022
- Area
- 520 m²
- Programme
- Coastal villa
- Structure
- Local stone, concrete, green roofs
04
Forest Chapel
- Place
- Location, Country
- Year
- 2021
- Area
- 64 m²
- Programme
- Chapel for 40
- Structure
- Charred timber frame
In numbers
Years of building less, better.
0
Years
In practice, from one desk to a full studio.
0
Projects
Designed and built. None abandoned.
0
Awards
For timber, concrete, landscape and the way they meet.
The studio
One long table and a lot of cardboard.
Architects, model makers and landscape designers share one studio. Everything is worked out in the model first. If it does not stand on the table, it will not stand on the site.
- 18Architects and makers
- 1:50Where every idea is tested
Tuesday review, around the long table
Sanding the 1:50 model
Process
Four steps, no surprises.
The same method on a 64 m² chapel and a 500 m² house.
- 01
Read the site
3–4 weeksWe visit in every kind of light. Slope, wind, trees, the line of the horizon. Nothing is drawn until we know where the winter sun will sit.
- 02
Draw and model
2–3 monthsSketches, then card, then balsa. Every idea is tested as a physical model before it earns a drawing.
- 03
Detail and permit
3–5 monthsJoints, thresholds, the way rain leaves the roof. We detail with the builders in the room, so drawings can be built as drawn.
- 04
Build and stay
12–18 monthsA senior architect is on site every week until the last shutter is closed and the first fire is lit.
Material library
Six materials. Every project starts here.
Before we draw a wall we choose what it is made of. The library is a drawer of samples that travels to every site, so you can hold the building in one hand.
Board-formed concreteCast against rough timber boards
Oiled oakFloors, benches, joinery
Brushed brassHandles, thresholds, one light
Charred timberBurnt, brushed, oiled. No paint
Moss linenCurtains the colour of the forest floor
Local pineFelled close to the site
Start a project
Have a site? Let us walk it.
Tell us where it is and what you imagine. A partner replies within two working days, and the first conversation is always free.