Tree House

Greybrook

This completed project includes the demolition of an existing sub-standard dwelling and the construction of a new house for a young family outside Cork City. The dwelling employs a compact plan, to minimise the footprint whilst maximising opportunity for the garden to flow around the house. This allows the site to maintain its existing sense of place and charm afforded by existing trees and landscape. The house is formed of a rustic base or trunk containing the living spaces with the bedrooms floating above in the canopy of the forest and surrounding landscape. At ground floor level the square plan is divided along a north/south axis so as to afford living spaces opening south onto the garden with “servant” spaces facing north. This allows the proposed house to be orientated to take best advantage of the views to the surrounding landscape and to maximise the use of southerly light for natural heat gain. At first floor level the bedrooms are conceived as individual identities that respond to the surrounding landscape. The bedrooms are arranged in a pin-wheel pattern around the central point of the square. The form of the bedrooms to the east is manipulated to bend around the existing large tree. The master bedroom is orientated to take advantage of long views to the tree at the end of the garden.