Does a luxury villa have to stand out from the surrounding architecture, subjugate its surroundings and communicate the material status of its owners? Not necessarily - this is demonstrated by the Dom na skraju, located near Warsaw, by 77 STUDIO architektury, which fits discreetly into the space between the villa estate and the centuries-old forest.
Jabłonna is a suburban village located in the midst of a natural forest landscape. The picturesque town is filled with villas and residential estates, there is also an 18th century park and palace complex of Bishop Michał Poniatowski. Right next to the borders of the village is also located the Yablonovsky Beech Forest Reserve with a stand of trees varying in age and species, with beech specimens dating back 160 years. It was at the junction of one of the villa settlements and the reserve that the House on the Edge was built.
The primary goal became to inscribe the building into two aesthetically distinct spaces. - We thought of the house as a communal collection of a residential estate and a forest, creating an urbanistic and stylistic bridge between two orders of different character. This is how the idea of the House on the Edge was born," says its author Pawel Naduk, architect and owner of 77 STUDIO architecture studio.
House on the edge in Jabłonna
Photo: Piotr Krajewski © 77 Studio of Architecture
at the meeting point of two worlds
On Topolowa Street, not far from where 77 STUDIO Architektury's project was implemented, many massive two- and three-story villas have been built over the years, dominating the natural surroundings with their size, bright facade and "fortress-like" character. The House on the Edge is completely different - its single-story form seems to blend in with the surrounding stand of trees. The 560-square-meter residential building was erected in the form of a pavilion composed of horizontal, geometric blocks with minimalist forms. However, formal restraint is not the only feature that makes the building an architectural link between nature and the built-up space.
House on the edge in Jabłonna
Photo: Piotr Krajewski © 77 Architecture Studio
architectural camouflage
On the street side, unlike many of the surrounding residences, the house is devoid of a fence. On the square created in front of the property sit two rectangular blocks, perpendicularly located in relation to each other, between which hides the entrance to the house. From this side, the monolithic facade was entirely covered with unprotected wood, which visually blends with the stand of trees surrounding the building on three sides. This way of solving the front facade provides the intimacy necessary in a private home, while creating a formal bridge between the natural areas and the surrounding development. Devoid of windows, the facade takes the form of a symbolic "forest border", over which the crowns of the surrounding trees tower.
A house on the edge in Jablonna
Photo: Piotr Krajewski © 77 Architecture Studio
checkerboard in a forest glade
The residence looks completely different from the side of the forest. Here the landscape "invades" its interior thanks to several interesting solutions. The first of these is the spatial disposition of the building, which was composed of a set of interconnected rectangular blocks, irregularly scattered on the spacious plot. The seemingly random way in which the individual elements of the house are distributed seems to reproduce the arrangement in which the area was overgrown with a natural stand of trees. Its protection was, moreover, guided when determining the floor plan of the residence. Thanks to the sophisticated layout of the masses, a diversified spatial characteristic of the object was created, thanks to which the house contains both highly exposed rooms and more private enclaves.
House on the edge in Jabłonna
Photo: Piotr Krajewski © 77 Architecture Studio
The interior and exterior of the house also intermingle thanks to the use of appropriate finishing materials on the facades and in the rooms. The exterior walls were composed for the most part with untreated wood cladding and large window openings, whose dimensions and placement optically blur the boundaries between the interiors of the residence and the surrounding forest. The effect is intensified by the use of the same materials both on the facades and in the rooms.
House on the edge in Jabłonna
Photo: Piotr Krajewski © 77 Architecture Studio
forest under the window
The last of the treatments to meld the villa with the surrounding landscape was how to manage the greenery on the vast plot of land available to the house's owners. This task was handled by Malgorzata Sobótka of Studio Landscape.
Although the close forest environment is the main asset of the site, we did not want to allow the forest under the house itself. We created a gentle, harmonious transition between the old-growth forest and the space around the building used by the owners," says the landscape architect.
House on the edge in Jablonna
Photo: Piotr Krajewski © 77 Architecture Studio
This goal was achieved by introducing an appropriate gradation of vegetation. The space located directly next to the house was developed using lower plantings - undergrowth, perennials, ferns, shrubs and low trees of calla, ginkgo and arborvitae. Small gardens with birch trees, for example, are squeezed in between the various segments of the residence. Analogous plant-filled spaces have also been arranged inside the house, reinforcing the impression of integration of individual rooms with the surrounding landscape.
House on the edge in Jabłonna
Photo: Piotr Krajewski © 77 Architecture Studio
comfort above all
Despite its simplicity, formal austerity and strong ties to nature, there is no denying that the house on the edge of the forest is a luxurious and modern residence. This can be sensed primarily through the high quality of workmanship and the use of well-fitted materials. The residence is also equipped with a swimming pool and advanced control systems that cover virtually all installations - heating, water or lighting.
We tried to create a comfortable place for the owners to live, while being careful not to dominate this beautiful place," adds Pawel Naduk. - When implementing high-budget houses, it is often an important and difficult aspect for investors to exercise restraint. We are glad that in this case the owners fully trusted us, so together we worked out every detail. We hope that the building, while meeting the very high requirements of the users, will also remain in a noble symbiosis with its surroundings.
