Dog Trot House | Poplarville | Mississippi | Waggonner and Ball Architects

This small weekend house for a New Orleans couple is sited in the rural hills of southern Mississippi overlooking a small pond. Set in a context of small farms, scrub land and intermittent pine forests, the design draws its form and materiality from the simple vernacular prototypes anchored out in the neighboring fields: small barns, chicken coops, tin sheds and mobile homes. The dog trot prototype, typical in the rural South, was the plan generator, making the house a frame or gateway for the pond and landscape beyond. This open space, which serves as a sheltered and informal dining porch, provides a cool, breezy place to sit on hot days. The open porch divides and defines the functions of the structure which is comprised of four cells: a storage/workroom, the dining porch, a living space and a screened porch......more