House Curtis

The prevailing rationale for this building has been for it to be responsive to its context. It is a small building, designed to be a pavilion, and located on its site so as to minimize impact on the landscape whist not denying its man made essence.

The brief was for a weekend house in the Mount Bain Reserve, which needed to be compact due to a tight budget. ‘Formalized camping’ was a description that emerged which became the programmatic concept. Living space took the bulk of the space budget with sleeping spaces being compact and functional. The total extent of the house including the covered stoep is 100m², providing sleeping accommodation for six people.

The property is 8ha in extent within the Mount Bain Reserve. Siting of the building was the subject of deliberation at the first site visit, where there was the luxury and liability of being able to select a site from a number of suitable locations. It is interesting to note that whilst the choice of location stood up well to post-rationalization, it’s selection on site was largely intuitive – ‘it felt right’.

The square, being one of the more cost effective shapes to build, was chosen as a starting point. The overall plan shape therefore is a square, comprising a number of smaller squares that were pushed; pulled and broken to define space, provide focus and definition and to generate lines which would ‘finger’ into the landscape, routing the structure to it’s site. The broken square therefore became the formal concept and all spaces, barring the generous covered stoep, were worked down to their minimum (with the guide of Le Corbusier’s modulor) to attain economy with functionality. The only formal bedroom became a folly to the drive for economy and compactness. Its plan dimensions are 2,3 x 2,3m, whilst it’s height is 4,5m with openings on three sides successfully mitigating its smallness with volume and light.

South East Elevation

Stone was an obvious choice of material, which was also subject to budgetary constraint. It was used for wall construction, not throughout, but in limited areas. This gave rise to the tectonic concept of rebuilding a ‘found ruin’. The base and corners became the ‘remains’ of the ‘found structure’ and the brickwork then ‘rose’ out of this.

South West Elevation

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