Saint-Hypolite is small town in the Laurentide, a scenic region used mostly as a weekend getaway for Montrealers. The house is built within a dense forest on a slight hill, bordering the opening of a small river. Through the trees, we perceive the body of the black building, divided into three blocks that get linked through glass passageways.

These blocks are at split-levels from each other and are all in direct contact with the earth; three sections with their individual identity, offering intimacy from each other opening up towards the natural surroundings.

The entry block, open on two levels, comprises the family’s teen quarters and family room. The middle block hosts the living room; a friendly central space that opens onto the terrace. The final and private block, consists of the family’s private suite and enjoys a certain isolation from the rest of the home.

On the northern side of the house, a large sectioned wall, covered with bent corten steel, connects the blocks together while defining a series of covered outdoor spaces, always set against the light.

The esthetical attributes of the architecture are generated through the meeting and superposition of different geometrical shapes without stable parallel lines; an organic composition that gets inspired by the landscape that surrounds it. While the massing is fragmented, the geometric attributes of large oblique lines still gives certain coherence for the whole project. The proportion of each component within the mass is related to the others; the modification of each element having a direct influence on the rest.

With its geometry fragmented while organized along linear axis, the project provides a strong spatial experience, allowing at the same time a direct and variable contact with the surrounding landscape. The angular walls, made of dark and raw materials, bring unity to the house and help its integration into nature, like a rock that emerges from the ground or a forgotten shipwreck at the heart of the forest.

Plans

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Project details:
Location : Saint-Hyppolite, Québec
Area : 1850 sq.ft.
Year of construction : 2008/2009
yh2 design team : Benoit Boivin, Marie-Claude Hamelin, Loukas Yiacouvakis

 

Photographs by Francis Pelletier

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