Seattle-based studio Olson Kundig Architects has completed the Glass Farmhouse project on a rural site in Northeast Oregon.
Completed in 2007, the 1,450 square foot residence sits next to an eye catching barn on a 80 acres lot.
Jim Olson, principal of Olson Kundig Architects envisioned the two structures as objects in the landscape.
“The barn roof aims toward the ground and the house roof aims toward the barn,” he says. “They shape a space.”
Though the barn traces its roots to the local vernacular and the glass house takes a more modern tack, the buildings share a sense of proportion and scale.
Glass Farmhouse by Olson Kundig Architects:
“Located in Northeast Oregon, this small house is conceived as a contemporary glass box that floats atop the surrounding wheat fields. The design of the house and the accompanying wood-frame barn responds to the local vernacular of barns and farmhouses in the Pacific Northwest while responding to the client’s deep interest in the design of Philip Johnson’s Glass House.
Facing south towards the distant mountains, the house adapts well to the cold, snowy winters and hot, dry summers. In the winter, the orientation takes advantage of passive solar heat gain from the low-angled winter sun; in the summer, roof overhangs and a light shelf block the high hot summer sun from entering. Large, operable windows of high-efficiency glass provide cross-ventilation cooling, lessening the house’s need for air-conditioning.
The house rests on a concrete foundation, which isolates the heat-absorbing and -releasing mass from the ground plane.”
Photos by: Tim Bies
I may have missed it, but do we know what this place would cost to build?
Looks pretty simple, in design, and hopefully somewhat inexpensive. If we built two, side by side, we’d really have something… big! Now, where . . . to . . . put them . . .