The Location is the Canvas The Location is the Canvas The Location is the Canvas The Location is the Canvas

March 26, 2020

The Location is the Canvas

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An extraordinary place in the southern part of the Moravian-Silesian Beskydy in the Czech Republic with almost no other building nearby becomes the perfect landscape for Pavel Míček Architects to place this piece of architecture, that seems unpretentious in its looks but is complex in its creation.

The plot borders on the road from the upper part and are formed by a wild mountain meadow sloping down to a wooded shadowy gully with a flowing brook.

“We need to look for things that do not exist.“

Pavel Míček

“The process of finding the center of the design was not too easy, being significantly influenced by the Beskydy Protected Landscape Area Administration and its rigid building regulations, which complicated the creative or innovative approach,” says the architect, Pavel Míček.

“The first ideas were not related to space and volume. They were of the material which could express the context and serve as a pivotal conceptual guideline. Concrete and larch wood were decided upon and the next question we were faced with was how could the characteristic features of these materials which were contrasting to a large degree be used in the best way and with minimal means,” explains Pavel Míček.Arou

The base of the house is a cast concrete cuboid, sunken into the hillside, while its more lightweight upper level is a triangular prism clad in larch boards and shingles. Inside, bedrooms, bathrooms, and utility rooms are all located on the lower level. This completely frees up the first floor, which serves as a spacious living space, dining area, and kitchen, with plenty of room for guests.

Larch covers walls, floors, and ceilings, matching kitchen cabinets and a few bespoke furniture elements.

With its simple A-frame shape, the house is designed to match the traditional properties of the region, which the architect describes as both heavy and light, touching on the use of concrete and wood. But even with its back to basics use of material, this is clearly a modern building, featuring simple materials and fuss-free details. Wood and exposed concrete and in some places even painted concrete forms the vocabulary of the house.

Two light larch boards, holding the free-flowing space with open views into mountain scenery, were then supported against each other on this piece of rock. There is no set pattern for anything in the house; the windows come in different sizes and the two staircases, positioned alongside one another, also contrast with one another. The first, leading up from the ground floor, is made from steel. The second, ascending to the mezzanine is made from wood and has storage space concealed underneath it.

The undisrupted surrounding landscape around the house continues to flow almost unnoticed. The concrete shall turn grey and overgrow with moss, the larch wood shall gain a greyish-silver patina, and the access path from sandstone stones shall be barely seen in the meadow grass. And the house will fade into the surroundings, be a part of the flora and fauna and yet be a space of comfort and safety.