Architecture studio Tectoniques has built a house from concrete dyed with ochre that emerges from the ground in Saint-Cyr-au-Mont-d'Or, France.
Called P House, the semi-hidden structure has a rough, rugged exterior designed to blend into the slope of the land.

Tectoniques fabricated the house from a specially developed concrete, created together with materials supplier Lafarge. It is made using coarse aggregate and less water than standard concrete.
In order to create a thick, imperfect end result, the concrete is vibrated ? shaken to release air bubbles ? manually.
Ochre dyes are added to white concrete. The designers created a sandy colour for the facade that echoes the hue of an existing 19th-century building on the site.

The new house has three distinct levels and functions as an inverted twin to the existing house. "This is an idea that comes naturally from the geography of the site," said architect Max Rolland.
"The street serves the plot from above and the part of the plot that can be used as a garden is located ten metres below."

Special foundations and civil engineering work were used to position eight-metre-high piles, to retain the hill behind the wall.

The top of the house is level with the road and has space for parking.
It is the only part of the building that can be seen from the road, with the buried underground volume of the iceberg-style house much greater than the visible volumes.
"This apparent 'disappearance' is actually acc...