Unique Mountain Retreat |Virginia | Montgomery + Townsend Architecture and Design

The Mountain Retreat is an interior renovation for an eclectic and unique mountain retreat located on a mountain top in central Virginia. Originally designed by a mathematician in the 1970’s, the plan is designed around a pentagon, and placed strategically in a large cleared meadow.

The strategy was simple in the end - white washing the eclectic palette and simplifying all materials in the home while still maintaining the unique geometry and eccentricity of the original design. White washed oak floors from a fallen oak tree on the new owner’s property replace the existing flooring. Similarly, a new walnut kitchen uses reclaimed walnut from the owner’s land. A new bathroom layout is introduced to have more of a contemporary plan while maximizing the space, and is lined in clear cedar. A simple kitchen is introduced as well to maximize the small area, and clear up the island for dining and entertaining. A new powder room, and built in bunk beds transform the lower level into a usable and comfortable space.........more

Modern Mountain House Design | Residence Arbalete | Piedmont | APPAREIL architecture

Revitalization of a home located in the Laurentians with the objective of creating a more coherent whole and responding to the surrounding context as well as to the current needs of the client. Elements of the pre-existing architecture, including the old wooden beams, have been preserved in the new design, creating an interesting contrast with the contemporary style of the space. A large extension serves as a link between the house and the surrounding nature.....more

Colorado Modern Home | Bar House | Rocky Mountains | GLUCK PLUS

This large family house is located on a deep narrow valley, bounded by a river on one edge and a road on the other. The winter weather is severe, and the sun reaches the bottom of the valley only from the south. Unlike the surrounding houses, this house runs perpendicular to the valley to maximize the southern exposure. The linear program allows each room to receive the southern exposure and provides spectacular views of the valley......more

Colorado Modern Mountain Home | Rocky Mountains Guest House | Colorado | GLUCK PLUS

This 2,850 SF guest house in the Rocky Mountains integrates into and accentuates its mountain environment. Two intersecting bar shapes bookend to complete the implied courtyard of the original house, creating a high mountain yard that connects the two structures into a single family gathering place. Planes of ‘roof meadow’ render the house practically invisible from the road, and sculpt a private sunken court. Continuous clerestory glass focuses the panorama views and provides a completely day-lit space. A thick solar wall separates the service side of the building from the main courtyard while creating a secondary space for cars, storage, and the harvesting of solar energy.....more

Alpine Ski Apartment | Kranjska Gora | Slovenia | OFIS Arhitekti

The project is located in the Slovenian alpine town Kranjska Gora on the north western corner of the country. The brief required a public ground floor and small apartments on the upper floor that could be converted into bigger units.
Concept design-initial urban cube-cutout the cube in vertical and horizontal planesThe concept design was initially dictated by strict local building regulations, height and footprint plot limit which partially led to the building form.
The first step was pasting maximum volume on the site -a cube on the allowed urban footprint. The final form derived from cutting the cube in the vertical and horizontal planes. Horizontal cut - pitched roof with flat top to hide service ventilation pipes and chimneys.Vertical cut - angled corners with inserted wooden balconies allowing the building a softer, less substantial volume appearance....more

Mountain House | House Ocho | Santa Lucia Mountains | Feldman Architecture

Located in a nature preserve in the Santa Lucia Mountains, the site of oak forests and steep meadows strongly impacted and inspired Feldman Architecture’s design for House Ocho. In order to reduce the impact of the home’s massing and to preserve site lines, the building settles into the ground and overhanging roofs are planted with tall native grasses. The house is also divided up into a series of pavilions to lessen its overall mass.

After passing through an entry grove, visitors can see distant views between and over the various building elements. As they are drawn into the widening view, they are led down from the tree-lined ridge to a large terrace that serves as an outdoor living room for the house. Nearly every room has wide doors that open to the land allowing the modest home to feel much more spacious.

House In Austerlitz | New York | Anmahian Winton Associates

This 2,500 square foot weekend house occupies a high plateau in the Berkshire Mountains with dramatic views across the Hudson River Valley. An open, narrow plan and glass walls allow occupants to simultaneously experience the surrounding landscape and the indoor spaces.
The living area is conceived as a single room for living, cooking, and dining, with an open kitchen serving as the centerpiece of the house whose owner is a food critic, author, and cook. The traditional “back porch” of the house is rendered in minimal terms as a stone terrace with a broad cantilevered roof.........more

Casa 4 Planos | Dear Architects

With a double ulterior motive, assure the views to the surrounding mountains and provide an specific relation in between each living area and the interior outdoors, a 10m cube is placed 10m behind the street limit, inducing the division of the plot on four identical frames of 5m X 10m; such fragmentation allowed to incorporate the garden as the void that articulates the relationship between the volume of the house and the frontal volume. The character that the house transmits to the exterior is given by the sobriety of its 4 planes, which are distinguished by its change in height and the arrangement of its openings given by the relationship that each bedroom establishes with the exterior; searching for a view and an specific light-shadow effect to complete the tacit sense of inhabitance.....more

Putney Mountain Residence | Vermont | KWSA

The site on the southwestern slope of Putney Mountain is characterized by heavily wooded terrain, large outcroppings of ledge, and dramatic sweeping views. Three clearings in the woods frame the approach to the house from the east and open up the site to the surrounding landscape. The house consists of three simple volumes arranged around a large outcropping of exposed ledge. A living volume faces the western mountains, sleeping quarters face a southern meadow, and a shed volume houses storage and mechanical equipment. Putney Mountain house was reviewed in the Wall Street Journal Weekend Journal on Friday 30 January 2009.....more

Granite Mountain Cabin | Arizona | Lawrence Architecture

This 2,160 SF vacation home for an active family of four has an "L"-shaped plan with the main living spaces in one wing and the private spaces in the other. The house opens out to the substantial westerly views, while the kitchen (in the corner of the L) looks back to an aspen grove and a seasonal wetland. A garage and apartment for guests are connected via a breezeway. The general contractor was The Patterson Company......more

Chalet | Villars Switzerland By BFLS

Nesting above the town of Villars in Switzerland, the chalet enjoys spectacular views of the surrounding mountains. Spread over three levels and partially dug into the mountain, its plan form responds to its context and orientation.

Despite the traditional overhanging roof, this is an utterly modern building. On entering from the downward side of the mountain, the chalet opens up into a double-height living space looking out across the valley. At one end of the living space, a lowered ceiling creates a more intimate area, the view framed by a glazed fireplace in the facade. The house is triple-glazed throughout....more
Project Details
Height:159 metres
Quantum:26,000m2
Project Status:Complete

House AJ at Vitacura | Santiago | Gonzalo Mardones Arquitectos

House AJ at Vitacura

Due to the fact that the house is located in a privileged place on the Cerro Manquehue mountain, the main idea was to use a material which would tend to become a part of that mountain: concrete with the incorporation of ochre pigments (1 x 4” pine boarding molds and boards for slabs).
The house opens onto the garden through volumes which frame the best views. Independent units form groups of rooms in such a way as to avoid invading each other. In spite of being an “L” shaped plan, the rooms do not face each other.
From a compositional point of view the house is a square separated into various volumes ordered in a very basic manner. The façades of the habitable rooms open onto the landscape and that of the services are walled and protected from the mountain by courtyards.
The decision was taken to place the house at the highest point of the site in order to obtain views over the neighboring houses of the Vitacura section of the city of Santiago......more

Steinhaus-Stonehouse | Lake Ossiach,Austria | Gunther Domenig

Günther Domenig: Steinhaus--Stonehouse -- Günther Domenig is known as a non-conformist in the Austrian architectural scene. Steinhaus--Stonehouse tells the story of the conception and construction of his home and studio within a remote mountain landscape.
Steinhaus--Stonehouse tells the story of the conception and construction of a home cum studio cum intellectual haven for the architect in a landscape which has been part of his personal memory bank of images since childhood. Though the interest in this Folio lies undoubtedly in its description of a particular and highly personal creative process, the problems of response to site, landscape, image and memory which the architect confronts have a wider resonance. This Folio contains twenty-two plates of sketches, drawings and computer drawings by the architect plus an illustrated booklet which documents through an interview, photographs, poems and sketches, the particular context within which Domenig's work has grown and the story of the development of the Steinhaus project.
Photographs:Margherita Spiluttini