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Architects: PLOTNONPLOT Architecture Inc.
- Area: 2700 ft²
- Year: 2024
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Photographs:Kevin Belanger
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Manufacturers: Bespoke
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Lead Architects: Bex Fernando
Text description provided by the architects. Taking experiential cues from a rabbit's lair, this home was custom-built for a growing family in the residential Westboro neighborhood of Ottawa. Hidden behind an existing tree and a protective wooden screen detail, the main living spaces are embedded into the ground, allowing domestic warmth to radiate upward and out while providing safety from the street.
Despite a modest footprint, the home's internal organization playfully subverts the family dwelling by shifting the expectations of levels, views, light, and sound. The familial joys of dining, conversation, music, and play can be felt in various moments and configurations exemplified through the large vertical space carved from the home's center.
Vegetated roofs, thoughtful circulation, terraces, and divergent openings blur the ground plane across the various levels. The relationships of entrance/emergence, connectivity/seclusion, and descent/ascent can be explored and celebrated through this careful arrangement of the program. Clever opportunities for retreating and reflection are tucked away to facilitate the need for silence and rest.
Internal materials were carefully chosen to be both timeless [wood, glass, linen, concrete] but reflect the whimsies of the family for which this home was created [tile, wallpaper, artwork, textiles]. This minimal palette is echoed in the exterior which employs black steel and wood to enfold the chambers inside and selectively reveal and conceal the activity of the home within.
