Architecture
How Will Your New House Meet the Ground?
The choices you make early on can affect the whole project – here's how to make your house beautiful from the foundations up
When we praise a great building, we often start by referencing the site. But my feeling is, great buildings – wherever they are – are arrived at by a series of great decisions. While a site can certainly lift a project, a great design can sing on any site. There are a series of moves or design decisions an architect makes along the way with their client that, while individually subtle, build on each other to create something beautiful in concert.
How a building or object is connected to the site or land is one of those moments: it sets the tone for how the occupants will engage with the other elements, and with their surroundings – and vice versa.
How a building or object is connected to the site or land is one of those moments: it sets the tone for how the occupants will engage with the other elements, and with their surroundings – and vice versa.
Here’s another example of timber piles: on this house by Daniel Marshall, the act of setting them back into the shadows allows the perimeter or edge of the building to be clearly read, providing a soft gesture towards floating whilst still providing clear direction to the landscaping and external environment. The house both connects with the land but has a pleasant distance from it.
An alternative is a classic concrete foundation at ground level. Projects based in this approach can have a very easy dynamic and interplay with its site and its greater environment – as with this house by Daniel Marshall, in which the internal floor is at the same level as the ground. With a little thought, this most basic and common construction technique can be easily refined.
2. Floating
Floating, as it implies, is suspended or cantilevered into the air. Projects of this nature simply ignore the surrounding site, ground and environment and hover unconstrained by it. With this house in Vancouver by Splyce Design, the dining room is extruded from the house, cantilevered over a small garden and glazed on three sides, bringing the outside directly in to this otherwise solidly grounded house.
Floating, as it implies, is suspended or cantilevered into the air. Projects of this nature simply ignore the surrounding site, ground and environment and hover unconstrained by it. With this house in Vancouver by Splyce Design, the dining room is extruded from the house, cantilevered over a small garden and glazed on three sides, bringing the outside directly in to this otherwise solidly grounded house.
Floating-based designs became popularised in the 1970s but more recently, it’s become common for a building to incorporate a floating element into it as a design feature or to draw from the concept by utilising a large built design over a small connection to the site.
With the Tea Houses – a collection of pavilions in the woods in Silicon Valley – Swatt | Miers Architects built a solid concrete retaining wall to create a flat building platform. The buildings are grounded by concrete fin walls, off which the open-plan spaces cantilever.
With the Tea Houses – a collection of pavilions in the woods in Silicon Valley – Swatt | Miers Architects built a solid concrete retaining wall to create a flat building platform. The buildings are grounded by concrete fin walls, off which the open-plan spaces cantilever.
Another pavilion in the series of three buildings on the site. The floor is cantilevered out over the ground, skimming the gravel in a particularly elegant way.
3. Emerge
Emerge-based designs blur the lines between structure and environment. In some examples – such as this house in the Cotswolds by Found Associates – the buildings appear to be a build-up of ground strata. Here, the path becomes wall, and the wall becomes house, connected solidly to the ground through a selection of materials that are broadly of the same materiality.
Emerge-based designs blur the lines between structure and environment. In some examples – such as this house in the Cotswolds by Found Associates – the buildings appear to be a build-up of ground strata. Here, the path becomes wall, and the wall becomes house, connected solidly to the ground through a selection of materials that are broadly of the same materiality.
Here’s another from Found Associates, this time in London. Raised from the ground on a solid plinth, there is no visual difference between internal and external: the two are the same, drawing you into the building and connecting you solidly with the ground.
To be really effective, emerge-based projects – such as this one, again by Found Associates – require space and scale to enable the whole story to be told, since quite often these buildings are single storeyed. In this case, a low stone extension connects beautifully with the ancient stone building next to it, while connecting with the ground solidly in a way the older building can’t: it’s a few steps down from the older building to the new. Note the way the building seems to rise up out of the grass.
4. Touched
Touched projects are purposefully set at least one storey above the ground and are based in the notion of respectfully connecting with the fullest context – the landscape and natural environment is visible below and through the building.
It is most common for projects of this nature to have floors set into the trees – as with this house by Keuka Studios in upstate New York. The house is anchored at one end and a covered open-air pavilion is set on delicate steel poles above the slope at the other. It appears to disappear into the trees as it does so.
Touched projects are purposefully set at least one storey above the ground and are based in the notion of respectfully connecting with the fullest context – the landscape and natural environment is visible below and through the building.
It is most common for projects of this nature to have floors set into the trees – as with this house by Keuka Studios in upstate New York. The house is anchored at one end and a covered open-air pavilion is set on delicate steel poles above the slope at the other. It appears to disappear into the trees as it does so.
It’s common with these houses for the building to borrow from from an interesting environment – as with this house by Room 11 in Hobart, Tasmania. The key to projects of this nature is simplicity, which is often easier said than done in relation to the more practical aspects of a building and its function. The house is visibly connected to its environment by steel foundations (rather than being cantilevered as a Floating house might be). Glass on three sides draws in the surrounding landscape, providing a lightweight feel.
5. Cut
At the opposite end of the spectrum, Cut-based projects either appear to retreat into or emerge from the ground – which the Villa Vals by SeARCH Architecture does in a particularly memorable sort of way. The house sits behind an ancient stone building but retreats into the hillside with a concave facade, which creates a generous courtyard in front.
At the opposite end of the spectrum, Cut-based projects either appear to retreat into or emerge from the ground – which the Villa Vals by SeARCH Architecture does in a particularly memorable sort of way. The house sits behind an ancient stone building but retreats into the hillside with a concave facade, which creates a generous courtyard in front.
The fundamental difference between an emerging and cut-based project is that a cut project has a clear differential with its environment – as my practice achieved with the Stradwick House in Auckland.
While it is respectful to its context – leaving the slope surrounding the house virtually untouched – its construction possibilities are freer, since the house doesn’t have to follow the slope.
TELL US
What do you think of these architectural techniques – what would you choose for your project and why?
MORE
See 6 Homes That Rise to the Rural Landscape
This Great Land: 8 Aussie Homes That Show Off Their City
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While it is respectful to its context – leaving the slope surrounding the house virtually untouched – its construction possibilities are freer, since the house doesn’t have to follow the slope.
TELL US
What do you think of these architectural techniques – what would you choose for your project and why?
MORE
See 6 Homes That Rise to the Rural Landscape
This Great Land: 8 Aussie Homes That Show Off Their City
Houzz Tour: Old Foundation, New Marvel
Landed refers to the so-called arrival of the building in its surroundings. The most common and often most cost-effective take on this is a traditional pile floor using piles sunk into the ground, with the beams of the floor strung across them.
Done right – as with this little house by Strachan Group Architects – this suggests the building is well connected and purposefully placed in its context. Here, the deck extends from the house: instead of a skirt around the deck, the architects left the structure exposed, showing how the house floats lightly above the gently sloping section.