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Architects: QueckArchitektur
- Area: 153 m²
- Year: 2024
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Photographs:Herbert Stolz
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Lead Architect: Severin K.V. Queck
"Komorebi", the project’s name, comes from Japanese and means “light filtered through the leaves of the trees”. Remotely behind a small village in the Naab Valley, the black cube lies quietly on the edge of the forest. Set in an extensive natural landscape, which with its river and wooded hills is the most defining element in the context, the building's dark color scheme and low height subordinate it to everything that nature has created here. All rooms face south capturing the wide view and the sun.
Wood, the primary material in this project, is revealed both on the facade and inside. Carbonized boards made of Japanese cedar are used on the outside, which are made resistant to water, fire, sun and insects thanks to the charcoal. Inside, light spruce dominates as solid elements on the walls and ceiling. Complemented with limestone on the ground and clay and linen, an exciting contrast is created between hard and soft surfaces.
The heat in winter is provided by both the sun via the large glazing on the south side and a massive clay wall made of 18 tons of unfired earth in the middle of the living room. A steel insert with two windows on both sides of the wall is fired with wood. Due to the high mass, the heat is stored and released into the room. This ecological energy concept is complemented by a photovoltaic system on the extensively green roof of the house. The outer walls of the building consist of 18 cm of solid spruce and 24 cm of wood fiber insulation. The base plate and flat roof are also made of solid spruce. Rainwater from the roof is stored in a tank and used to water the garden.
With a total length of 19 meters, the living areas are lined up next to each other. The main entrance and the secondary zones act as a separation between the bedroom and bathroom in the east and the public spaces in the west. Here the solid clay wall is positioned in the centre of the living room. Inside, room zones are defined not only by walls but also by floor-to-ceiling built-in cupboards. This creates a very reduced, quiet living atmosphere that always keeps the surrounding nature in focus.
