Bernd Schmutz Architekten

Dorfstrasse 32
Transformation of three existing houses
Three units with 300sqm net area
Energieberatung: Energieberatung NordOst
Statik: Baubüro Kröger
Completed
Team:
Luisa Behrendt, Marta Kazimierczak, Lukas Keller, Jonas Krause, Sara Madej, Simon Semerak, Leon Schade, Tamim Arab, Patricia Madrid, Paul Stockhausen, Freddy Vetter

Over several decades the original layouts of the building from the mid 1920s have been obscured by numerous subsequent alterations making the small rooms even smaller und disfunctional. Therefore the new design is aiming at bringing back the original typology which organises the three houses lengthwise into two flexible and generous halves, one with all small rooms like hallways, stairs, storage, kitchen and bathrooms, the other one with large flexible living-rooms. The new transformation clarifies the plan and section but it also optimises wall and floor build-ups with new internal layers of natural finshes, insulation and low-energy heating, all powered by renewables. Only low-carbon and natural materials have been used, the walls are insulated with hemp-crete, the floor’s sound insulation with soil and the terraces with stones and gravel from the adjacent filed, only 10m away from site.  On the GF a minimum of walls have been demolished to reduce costs and waste, whereas the attic floor is now laid out with large rooms reaching under the roof up to the ridge. All wall constructions are made from timber.
A long and deep veranda provides sheltered individual outdoor space towards the orchard garden, brings passive shading for south-facing rooms but also lends generosity to the building as a whole.
The transformation reinforces the linear character of the house on its long sides, at the same time it makes space and anticipates extensions on the gable ends which eventually may also become part of the internal rooms.