The existing family single-storey house with a gabled roof covered with a metal roof, intertwined with neighboring houses in terms of both structures and networks. It dates back to the 1930s and was built as one of many temporary houses in an emergency workers' colony at the bottom of a closed quarry. It underwent partial reconstruction at the beginning of the 1990s, when the openings in the masonry were modified, and plastic windows, a metal roof, and a new boiler were installed.
The layout of the house results from years of chaotic infill between the houses and does not meet today's needs at all. Each room has a floor at a different height, the clear heights of the rooms are low (2.15 m), localized moisture occurs, along with associated mold. The layouts are dark.
The aim of the proposed modification is to clean up the entire layout and structurally separate the building from the surrounding houses, including the construction of its own technical infrastructure connections and to increase the usable area of the object. At the same time, to bring as much natural light into the interior as possible. The simplest option is to raise the entire structure, which does not seem to be a fortunate solution considering the location, when using standard clear heights. We want to keep the building as low as possible, therefore we propose to increase the usable area by partially building on the existing yard with a new single-storey extension.
The original object should still be visually apparent, separated from the new part. We propose to unify and simplify the mass of the original part (the extensions are newly covered with a flat roof in one plane). The sloping roof is again covered with metal, but newly in anthracite color (the original was red), which refers to the original use of black asphalt strips as roofing for the original emergency houses, when the roofing landscape of the entire locality was diverse, emphasizing the "swallow’s nest," so typical for the area. The entire original volume is insulated with mineral wool and plastered.
The new extension is entirely designed with a flat roof; the walls are sandwich panels, where the exterior view is made of solid fired brick from demolition work on the original house. The bricks are meant to refer to the original inhabitants of the area, who were often employees of nearby brickworks, from which they brought the building material. The bricks are complemented with exposed concrete (plinth, cornice) which extends into the yard as a simple covering over the outdoor seating area.
The flat roofs are conceived as green extensive roofs, above the new extension complemented by a small terrace. The internal masonry, infill walls, etc. are designed from polished ceramic blocks.
In the proposal, the entrance to the house has been shifted to the new extension, which is entirely designed with the smallest possible construction height (the clear height inside is only 2.3 m and the ceilings are designed as exposed reinforced concrete slabs). The entrance leads to a hallway that allows passage through the house to the yard; immediately behind the entrance door, a technical corner is proposed, and on the other side, behind sliding doors, a small trapezoidal workspace is designed (responding to the shape of the plot). Before the doors to the yard, the hallway bends along the covered outdoor seating and heads into the original building, along which a library is proposed, in which doors to a separate WC and to a bathroom are located, which is illuminated inside by a skylight. As already mentioned at the beginning, the original house was entirely cleaned inside in the design, and residential rooms are placed in it. In the part under the gabled roof, there is a living room with a dining table (in this part, the space is completely open and illuminated from above by skylights) and a kitchenette, from which one can enter a small dressing room and ascend by stairs to the bedroom, which opens to the rock of the quarry via a dormer window. Doors are proposed from the living room to the part with former extensions, where now one room is designed, serving children. The room connects to a small inner atrium. The atrium illuminates the main living space through a seating window.
As mentioned above – from the outside, the reconstruction with the extension visually combines reinforced concrete, old solid burnt bricks, plaster, green vegetative roofs, and anthracite sheet metal elements. The openings are proposed as aluminum fillings, with triple glazing, as well as the entrance doors, which are fully glazed and allow passersby a view through the house into the yard. The interior consists of a combination of various natural materials. The new extension has a floor with mass-colored tiles, while the old part has a three-layer wooden oak laminate. Natural birch plywood runs through the entire house (furniture, cladding of the entrance, doors, ceiling of the living room and bedroom), locally colored plywood (blue – resting corner of the living room, pink – kitchen). The walls of the bathroom, WC, and areas above the kitchen counter are designed from Moroccan plaster. The gable and one wall in the children's room, workspace, and bedroom are designed as black clay with a golden flake infusion. The ceilings are exposed reinforced concrete with an imprint of wooden boards; exposed concrete also transitions into a new lintel above the new glazing (HS portal) from the living room to the yard, along with new supporting pillars around it. The rest of the walls are "classically plastered" and finished with a white coat.
The outdoor yard is partially covered; under the overhang, outdoor seating is proposed and the original garden barbecue (grill) is located. The roof has an opening that brings natural light into the entrance hallway. It is supported by two galvanized steel columns and connects to the reinforced concrete internal ceiling. The yard itself is paved with granite slabs, in combination with areas of brushed concrete and areas for vegetation. The garden transitions with wooden steps (the same wood is used in the internal atrium and on the outdoor terrace).
Technologically, the house is connected to the supply of high-voltage electricity, gas, water, and a unified sewage system. Heating is provided by a gas boiler and hot water underfloor heating. Wood-burning stoves are proposed in the living room. Hot water is stored in a boiler. A recuperative unit for forced ventilation is also proposed. The bedroom in the attic will be equipped with air conditioning. Rainwater will be collected into an underground tank and subsequently used for watering the garden and for flushing in the house.
The location retains the spirit of the 1980s when it was known as an artistic district, paying homage to this era with the imprint of artist TIMA on the exposed concrete, the bust of St. Methodius (as the patron of Moravia and co-patron of Europe) by sculptor Vladimír Matoušek in a niche on the gable, and the free inner gable wall in the living space that can be filled with paintings, posters, photographs, and other artifacts according to the taste and judgment of the house residents.
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