Flat House by Practice Architecture Is a Marvel of Low Carbon Design

[Celerity]

Another building that is grown rather than built.

https://www.treehugger.com/flat-house-by-practice-architecture-marvel-of-low-carbon-design-5323843



While researching the corrugated hemp panel that went into the marvellous MONC eyewear shop in London, I followed the trail to Margent Farm, described as being "just outside Pidley, a small village in Cambridgeshire between Huntingdon and Ely" in the United Kingdom. There, on a hemp farm owned by former film director Steve Barron, the hemp panel is used to clad Flat House, designed by Paloma Gormley of Practice Architecture.



The panel itself is fascinating, but what is behind it is a marvel. The building has a simple form thanks to planning rules that preserve the shape of the pole barn it replaced. But it's likely that Gormley might have designed it this way even had there been no restrictions because inside and out, it is a model of simplicity and restraint.

In a long interview with Rob Wilson of Architects' Journal, Gormley explains: "The design is driven both by the choice of material and the construction rationale. Our starting point was the raw materials from the farm. The body of the house is entirely made of materials that have been grown."

I have often written that when you look at the world through the lens of embodied carbon, everything changes. And indeed, this house changes the way one looks at how houses can be built or, in a sense, grown. Gormley has designed a house that she describes as "radically low in embodied carbon."



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[jimfields33]

1. Sorry. But that is god awful ugly.

And cheap looking.

[Celerity]

3. I can assure you it is not cheap in quality of construction, nor price

as for aesthetics, beauty is in the eye of beholder

[Mr.Bill]

2. It looks okay to me,

but I wouldn't consider it in a high (or even low) risk fire zone in California.

[hunter]

4. Yep. I want my roof and walls to be flame resistant.

It's hard to beat flat concrete tile roofs, stucco exteriors, rock wool insulation, and drywall.

The weak spot on many fire resistant homes is the windows. These shatter then burning embers blow in, igniting the home's flammable contents.