Architects: calimùcho – Auffray Deghorain, David Ameye, Amélie Compère, Arnaud Roberti
Location: Brussels, Belgium
Stability engineer: Mr Degallaix
Carpenter & roofer: JC Toiture – Mr Joel Croy
Photographs: Laurence Dubuisson
A family with 3 children gave us an appointment in front of their new purchase «to be renovated»… at least that is what they told us ! When we saw the building, or better, «the remains» of the building, we could not imagine that they were talking of a «renovation».
The «bad» state of the building played an enormous role in the motivation of our architectural choices :
- demolish de pinion… or better «finish its demolition» ;
- maintain a closed structure and organisation in the northern rooms… and still largerly open the southern rooms ;
- choose the different materials following the function of the building, and the expectations on the both sides.
While working on the site, we came across a pit in this building… we decided to create at its place a little lounge, more cosy.
We also took the decision to preserve a maximum of «finition elements» (stairs, doors, tiles, …) more for ecological and economical reasons than for architectural reasons.
Nevertheless, all this leads to, both technically and aesthetically consistent results.
The clients are private owners; Christophe and Barbara. They have 3 children, 2 daughters and 1 son.
The building is situated 40km south of Brussels. You have to cross 5 km of fields and meadows before reaching the building.
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- © Courtesy of calimùcho
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- © Courtesy of calimùcho
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- © Courtesy of calimùcho
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- © Courtesy of calimùcho
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- © Courtesy of calimùcho
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- plan 01
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- plan 02
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- elevation 01
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- elevation 02
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- elevation 03
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- section 01
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- section 02
Very nice renovation… this is my dream also to buy this kind of barn and do something cool with it….
Refurbishment ? you sure ?
From outside it looks like those industrial style sheds that garden centers use nowadays for selling lawnmowers and spades!
I don’t like the inside decoration, but the renovation is impressive… I don’t see any garden centers’ analogy in that project… I like.
It’s not a star architect’s project… But it looks pleasant. Congrats…
This is definitely an impressive reinterpretation from a tectonic and material perspective; however, I think what Daniel35 is alluding to (correct me if I’m wrong) is that the window wall system is more “corporate showroom” than “private residence”. In my opinion, the floor to ceiling windows are a little too manufactured and a lot of the character evident in the dilapidated barn is lost. Still a nice project, just would have personally treated the window wall differently.
The strength in this project is it’s ordinary simplicity, especially in plan.
However, I do agree that the glazing deserved a far more considered and sensitive approach. Both scale and detail are out of character with the rest of the building.
Actually I’m not a fan of the cheap looking roof edge (tiles) detail to the gable either.
In summary: Good but not great!
and no washbasin in the toilet…………