Sitting on a 3000sqm site with an average gradient of 45o the program required 22 cottages, house keeping and a small restaurant with a modest kitchen. Given the density and the gradient, cottages were designed as duplex units that faced the view to the north. With robust and bare stone walls on the two side faces, the cottages had a horse-like blinkered view that looked far across to the snows. Each thus though very close, as cut-off and isolated into a private world once indoors. The steep gradient also ensured a visual privacy and isolation.
The cottages themselves were bare minimal spaces with commanding double-height views that look far across the mountain scape. The building language was arrived at from two major decision – to keep the roof structure as lightweight as possible yet uncomplicated, and to allow for direct sunlight into the spaces that otherwise are on the northward slope of a hill and face north.
Prefabricated ferro-cement vaults were chosen to allow for both considerations. Neat and quiet, they cap each structure in an elegant gesture that does not jar with the calm and quiet of the mountainside.
