OLIVE TREE HOUSE
A rich, natural olive grove on the island of Aegina, Greece, acts as the foundation for the architectural synthesis. This setting, combined with the functional requirements of a relatively small summer house, establishes the guiding principles for the architectural concept and expands our exploration into “minimum habitation”.
The project comprises a single-storey house with an attic, conceived as a composition of distinct volumes, over which a four-pitched roof hovers, echoing the structure, morphology, and materiality of the surrounding olive trees. In reference to the cultivation activities and celebrations that traditionally take place around the foliage and trunk (pruning, harvesting, etc.), six new cores are designed to consolidate all infrastructure and utility spaces associated with habitation (cooking, heating, sleeping, etc.), allowing the remaining, more fluid and informal activities (dining, relaxing, playing, socialising, etc.) to develop freely around them. The transparency and porosity of the in-between void encourage framed views towards the olive grove, while inviting the landscape in and through the house, conflating indoors and outdoors to form a continuous field of inhabitation throughout the year. The sculptural form of the four-pitched roof derives from the analysis of the site constraints, the consideration of neighbouring views, and the need to incorporate a bedroom and a private balcony, within the attic volume.
Credits
Design Team: Eleni Vagianou, Tasos Theodorakakis | Structural Engineer: Antonis Gavalas
Awards