Garden House

Retirement Home Case Study

Swen Geiss

This single storey timber house is a specific response to the needs of the client. The aim was to create a sustainable home, which suits an active retirement. A rather detailed brief included a series of fairly small rooms. The spatial concept reflects unfulfilled dreams of a 1960's case study house and the previous experiences of inhabiting a 200 year old timber framed house. The deep garden plot of this [old] house served as the site. The final design incorporates a series of introverted, functionally defined spaces such as kitchen, bathrooms, heating, sauna, storage. They are formed by four solid timber cubes, which group around a multifunctional space. The latter extends into a number of fully glazed, garden oriented rooms with flexibility in use.

The sustainability strategy re-interprets positive experiences of inhabiting a timber house and heating with [local] wood. Prefabricated solid timber panels on a concrete base form the structural core of the compact house. High levels of renewable and recycled insulation [200-300mm of flax above ground, 400mm of foam glass aggregates below ground] combined with triple glazing in cork insulated wooden frames results in an overall low need for thermal energy. Remaining heat requirements are fully supplied by renewable resources, using a small wood pellet boiler [8kw] and 7m² of solar thermal collectors.

start on site	May 2007
completion	June 2008
gross external floor area	184,5 m²
total cost	£200,000
Client	private
Structural engineer	Prof. Dr. Thomas Jürges
Services engineer	team51.5°architects

selected contractors and suppliers

timber construction	Holzbau Luhn, Remscheid - Finnforest / Merk Aichach
windows	Schreinerei Mour, Solingen - Winter Holzbau, Thedinghusen
screed	Estrich Sommerfeld, Hanau