Grow Box / Merge Architects

Grow Box / Merge Architects

Grow Box  / Merge Architects - Windows, Door, ForestGrow Box  / Merge Architects - Windows, Chair, FacadeGrow Box  / Merge Architects - Windows, Brick, FacadeGrow Box  / Merge Architects - SofaGrow Box  / Merge Architects - More Images+ 11

Lexington, United States
  • Architects: Merge Architects
  • Area Area of this architecture project Area:  1975 ft²
  • Year Completion year of this architecture project Year:  2016
  • Photographs
    Photographs:John Horner
  • Manufacturers Brands with products used in this architecture project
    Manufacturers:  Big Ass Fans, Lutron, Duravit, Grohe, Aquastar, Aquastar On-Demand Hot Water, Asko, Bertazzoni, Carlisle Wide Plank Floors, Carrier, Custom Corten Steel Panels, Emtek, Flor, Hafele, Ikea, James Hardie, Kohler, Liebherr, Linnea, Lutron Automated Mesh Shades, +7
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Grow Box  / Merge Architects - Windows, Door, Forest
© John Horner

Text description provided by the architects. Grow Box is a 1975sf (185 m2) home in Lexington, MA, designed for an MIT University Professor, his wife, and their young son. The landscape surrounding the house is elaborately planted, with over 40 different varieties of Japanese maple trees painstakingly cultivated and maintained by the clients.

Grow Box  / Merge Architects - Windows, Brick, Facade
© John Horner

The extents of the existing gardens limited the footprint of the new house, and inspired an architecture that utilizes landscape to affect space that expands beyond the physical limits of the house. The resulting design is a compact volume penetrated by slot gardens and entry decks that both define space within the house, and erode the boundary between interior and exterior.

Grow Box  / Merge Architects - Sofa, Table
© John Horner

The slot recessed gardens are organized geometrically by a central courtyard garden that contains a single Himalayan birch tree. This garden, which will collect rain in the summer and snow in the winter, underlines one’s experience of the elements as the literal and metaphorical centerpiece of the home.

Grow Box  / Merge Architects - Windows, Chair, Facade
© John Horner
Floor Plan
Grow Box  / Merge Architects - Windows, Facade, Glass
© John Horner
Floor Plan

On the interior, each room is paired with at least one garden, the deep recessed rectangular proportions of which allow the clients to visually inhabit the garden while maintaining privacy from the neighboring houses and adjacent street.

Grow Box  / Merge Architects - Brick, Facade
© John Horner

On the exterior, the intriguing visual contrast between the crisp geometry of the house and the sinuous landscape is both enhanced and obfuscated by the tree-trunk hue of the weathering steel cladding. Large areas of glazing surrounding the slot gardens and floor-to-ceiling windows reflect the surrounding trees and plantings, further blurring the distinction between architecture and nature.

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About this office
Cite: "Grow Box / Merge Architects" 21 Jul 2016. ArchDaily. Accessed . <https://www.archdaily.com/791744/grow-box-merge-architects> ISSN 0719-8884

© John Horner

美国发光的盒子住宅 / Merge Architects

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