FIRE ISLAND
CRAB HOUSE
FLAT HOUSE
HEXAGON HOUSE
THE MODERN CABIN: Trilogy of Fire Island homes.
Projects revisiting the concept of the American cabin, updating it in a contemporary idiom through minimizing and stylizing the lines and architectural elements, while still remaining true to its purpose and traditional spirit as a private getaway.
The project was conceived in Ocean Beach, Fire Island, where the client is the owner of a 80’x50’ empty plot of land adjacent to an existing late 19th century beautifully ornate cottage -- owned by his mother -- which no longer responds to the personal needs of two generations of inhabitants.
The potential of the plot gives an opportunity to build a new and modern home instead of adding any jarring addition to the existing, historical one. Hopefully the new home would responding to the younger generation's lifestyle needs and affinity for innovative design.
This plot of land has been always used by the client’s mother as a beautiful garden, which has been enjoyed for decades by her neighbors. The sensitivity for the existing purpose of the garden has been the guiding force for the project's concept, in order to continue the original designation of the plot as a garden, while of course readapting it in the presence of the new suspended house.
The area and circulation underneath the house -- conceived as a "loggia" -- would fit with the surrounding context as an extension of the landscape itself. Therefore the architecture develops vertically as an effort to work within the tight plots of land, as well as to preserve as much of the pre-existing greenspace and meet the local hurricane and flood building codes of the site that require new construction to be elevated from the ground. The large rooftop-solarium itself can be viewed as an elevated footprint and extension of the ground as a recreational or private relaxation and meditation area. Indeed the old house has an existing meditation room, which it is now designated in an upper porch on the second floor.
This site, as conceived, becomes a fertile ground for improvisation in the effort to revisit non-urban American residential forms.
This project is a bold new conceptualization of the beach house, proposing different options and shapes, updating its vernacular form both aesthetically and to the era of eco-effeciency. These options became a trilogy of projects and each house tells a different story. The first option is zoomorphic in its design, inspired by a crab, reflected in the shape of its "legs" (piers).
The Hexagon House owes its geometric shape to inspiration from the eccentric forms of architect Andrew Geller’s 1960’s beach homes. With its dramatically angled walls and cutaway windows, the emphasis here is on maximizing interior volume while conveying exterior lightness.
The last option is a horizontal house, simply called the "Flat House". It explores a single-floor option and readjusts the plan and layout of a previous project -- revisiting the concept of the American cabin in Woodstock -- to a more vernacular design in Fire Island's mid-century architectural context.
The design is deliberately "essential" and "green" in its purpose in order to avoid any waste or excessive use of material. Every material surface has to respond to its purpose. In a "green" vision these homes are potentially non-invasive with the challenge and goal to become a zero-footprint home, like any significantly energy-efficient design as the energy generation and consumption can be "smart" (solar, thermal, etc.) The goal was also to develop a methodology that meets five criteria: a "smart", sustainable, aesthetically pleasing, cost-effective, energy-efficient solution for the building. Suburban sprawl, as we all know, is the built world encroaching further into the unbuilt. Today we need to use design to reverse the flow -- let the outside come into our homes and buildings. The concept is: We should let the outside inside and build the house around the “tree”. A moment reveals plenty of problems with this idea, but maybe ideas like this one could spark debate and discussion over how to do the necessary: reduce the footprint we make as a society, and reduce our cultural propensity to force the natural environment (and even our own natural bodies and minds) into regular shapes with right angles. In the broad context, sustainable architecture seeks to minimize the negative environmental impact of buildings by enhancing efficiency and moderation in the use of materials, energy, and development space. Most simply, the idea of sustainability, or ecological design, is to ensure that our actions and decisions today do not inhibit the opportunities of future generations. This term can be used to describe an energy and ecologically conscious approach to the design of the built environment.
Seeing as the client is an environmental commissioner of the local community, it underscores even more the mission of eco-efficient design. Basically the house is designed trying to meet green criteria by employing standard principles of thermal insulation in order to achieve the desired outcome (thermal comfort with low energy consumption). Ideally it would have active solar devices such as photovoltaic solar panels and solar water heating. It is going to be built – where possible -- with recycled or second hand materials -- such as reclaimed lumber for the wood panels – and a selection of insulation materials and insulated glazing. It is required by building codes in many areas as a mandatory energy conservation measure.
Crab house is built in a very simple, revealing steel frame structure that accentuates its lightness and holds together all the other architectural elements made of wood and glass panels. The facades are articulated by folding wooden panels that act as shudders and reveal -- when opened -- the glass skin of the building underneath. They also function to make the house as translucent or opaque to its surroundings, depending on the desired level of privacy. The shudders also totally close and secure the house for extended periods of time, and to protect it from various weather conditions.
It's like a showcase glass box filled with sea light, while containing a wooden skin that it alternately "sheds" or redresses itself with, according to the inhabitants' needs. The structural staircase and plant design of the plumbing-electrical-heating system "column" -- serving the interiors from the ground floor and interlocking with the building -- are centrally located in order to maintain the lightness but still increasing the stability of the structure.
The interiors have a modern layout with special attention to closet and containing space. The circulation is also important not to interfere with the house's private spaces but still easily connect the rooftop solarium -- as an alternately public or private space -- to the ground floor "loggia", when socialization and interaction with guests are welcome.
Finally the concept is to create a very simple but responsive shelter.
Fire Island is also an important landmark for this typology of architecture, where is still possible to follow -- from the establishment of this resort and communities in the late 19th century -- a clear historical, social and architectural stratification of the evolution of the beach house through different ages of our history, which is pretty unique. Fire Island communities have the privilege of being a showcase of this historical and architectural puzzle. Therefore it was right to update this puzzle with a new architecture responding to our modern age signature.