‘It has this feeling that you’re in a place that’s brand new,' principle designer Corey Martin says of Central Oregon, the location for his Portland-based firm Hacker Architects’ recent residential getaway project. It’s surprising to think of a place in the middle of an American state (even if wildly different geographically to Portland, all lush and green and rolling to the west of the Cascades, dryer and flatter to the east) as ‘brand new'; though comparatively, and geologically, it is, but that’s part of the magic of the designer’s architectural approach. Rather than start with the basic brief – four bedrooms, for a couple and their extended family – Martin and his team, Nic Smith and Jeff Ernst, started with the landscape – and its ideas.
‘The building itself tries to edit and frame and take the experience of the landscape visually apart when you’re inside it,' he continues. The form starts with a basic box whose elements become articulated and separated and reunited with long swaths of cedar siding. These opaque surfaces work in concert with massive open walls of windows divided only by the thinnest of frames, and smaller apertures, all of which stack together to create a rhythm of constant enclosure and reveal.
Both exterior and interior walls are made out of cedar, so as to promote both a visual continuity and a sense of tactility, and the only other colors are white and black. The architecture is in service of looking – and in particular, looking outward. ‘You’re getting forced to look at the sky, and you’re getting layering that lets you consider all these pieces of the landscape at different times, at different qualities of light,' Martin says.
‘It’s got this freshness in quality of light and smells,' Martin continues, describing the relative youth of the local volcanoes. And that's the conceptual heart of this project. It’s not about finding what you thought you were looking for; it’s about what you end up seeing.
INFORMATION
-
London bar Bauhaus Warehaus is a factory by day, drinking den by nightMixologist of the moment Remy Savage shakes up the world of cocktail-making with a hardworking sibling to A Bar with Shapes for a Name, his Bauhaus-inspired bar enterprise in east London
-
Copper piping turns contemporary lighting: the twist in JamesPlumb’s designs at Gallery FumiDesign studio JamesPlumb presents sculptural copper chandeliers and floor lights in its solo exhibition 'Rooted' at Gallery Fumi (until 25 January 2025)
-
Circling back: Lars Tunbjörk's uncanny office photography is revisited in a new bookFirst published in 2001 and long since sold out, 'Office' is revisited this month by the publisher Loose Joints, released with a second volume shot in Los Angeles, the previously unpublished LA Office
-
Light, nature and modernist architecture: welcome to the reimagined Longwood GardensLongwood Gardens and its modernist Roberto Burle Marx-designed greenhouse get a makeover by Weiss/Manfredi and Reed Hildebrand in the US
-
A bridge in Buffalo heralds a new era for the city's LaSalle ParkA new Buffalo bridge offers pedestrian access over busy traffic for the local community, courtesy of schlaich bergermann partner
-
Tour this Bel Vista house by Albert Frey, restored to its former glory in Palm SpringsAn Albert Frey Bel Vista house has been restored and praised for its revival - just in time for the 2025 Palm Springs Modernism Week Preview
-
First look: step inside 144 Vanderbilt, Tankhouse and SO-IL’s new Brooklyn projectThe first finished duplex inside Tankhouse and SO-IL’s 144 Vanderbilt in Fort Greene is a hyper-local design gallery curated by Brooklyn studio General Assembly
-
Tour Ray's Seagram Building HQ, an ode to art and modernism in New York CityReal estate venture Ray’s Seagram Building HQ in New York is a homage to corporate modernism
-
Populus by Studio Gang, the ‘first carbon positive hotel in the US’ takes root in DenverPopulus by Studio Gang opens in Denver, offering a hotel with a distinctive, organic façade and strong sustainability credentials
-
This Californian home offers the unexpected through ‘deconstructed’ desert livingGardens & Villas, a home in La Quinta, California, brings contemporary luxury to its desert setting through a collaboration between architects Andrew McClure and Christopher McLean
-
First look inside 62 Reade Street, a clock factory turned family home62 Reade Street, a boutique New York residential project by architects ODA, unveils its first apartment interior, styled courtesy of Hovey Design
