Alpine hut in the Laternser Valley
Alpine hut in the Laternser Valley Laterns, A 2011 Architects: Marte.Marte Architekten, Weiler Bernhard Marte, Stefan Marte Assistants: Clemens Metzler Structural planning: Frick Paul, Rankweil
At the edge of a forest in an alpine valley in Austria’s Vorarlberg region, a small fourstorey tower with a square base rises out of a steeply falling slope. Apart from the access road, the slope was left unchanged and the site kept in its original condition. The building’s homogenous material, carefully bushhammered concrete, marks it out from the surrounding green of the meadows and white of snow. Square windows of various sizes are distributed across the four wall surfaces and sit deep in the double-walled concrete shell, almost as if stamped out of it. On the entry level, which is accessed from outdoor steps, the building’s volume is cut back to two load-bearing corner elements, creating an outside area offering views and vistas that is protected from the weather. A spiral staircase connects the upper living area with the two more private levels below. Inside, the window openings with their wide, projecting solid oak frames look like landscape paintings, focusing the gaze on the mountainous massif, gentle slopes and dense forest. The floors, stairs, doors, fixtures and fittings, and furniture made of untreated oak form a warm contrast to the rough exposed concrete surfaces. The building’s inner shell was the first part concreted. Smooth plywood shuttering panels were used, giving the interior’s exposed concrete surfaces their velvety look. After the installation of high-strength cavity wall insulation and fibre-reinforced cement spacer sleeves, the outer shell was concreted using the inner shell’s existing anchor holes, which were subsequently closed with cement plugs. Profile strips were laid in the formwork to keep the building’s edges sharp after bush hammering. Bush hammering with a jackhammer gave the concrete walls their surface structure in patterns up to 3 cm deep. All the con necting surfaces of the embrasures and windows were also ridged with a flat cold chisel. The exterior walls were sprayed with a hydrophobic coating to protect them from damp.
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3 1st floor c
b
a
a
1
2
aa d
Ground floor
d
b
c
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5 bb
1st basement level
7 6
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9
2nd basement level Floor plan Cross section Scale 1:200
1 Terrace 2 Entrance 3 Living area 4 Kitchen 5 Bedroom
6 Sauna 7 Shower 8 Cellar 9 Storeroom /technical equipment
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