Swiss architecture studio Madeleine Architectes has converted an old pigsty and clad it in lime and hemp to create the base of this house and office in Chavronay.
Named The Recipe, the home sits between a farm and a henhouse on a rural site close to the French border and is designed as a place of retirement for the parents of a large family.
Madeleine Architectes has created The Recipe house in Chavronay
Madeleine Architectes coated the pigsty's existing brick shell in a layer of insulating lime and hemp, before topping it with a metal-clad upper level.
The upper level directly connects to the adjacent farm via a small wooden bridge.
It sits on an old pigsty
"Crafted by the marriage of the mineral [lime] and the vegetal [hemp], an insulating layer is directly applied to the existing facade, like an ointment caring for a wound," explained the studio. "A participatory workshop brought together the craftsman, the client, and the architect around the shaping of this new skin, which is expressed as an honest and raw coating," it continued.
It is connected to a surrounding farm
The Recipe's ground floor contains an office, while the first floor has an apartment. On the second floor is a communal dining room for both the residents and the surrounding farm.
New openings in the base of the building are fitted with small, black-shuttered windows for the bedroom, while on the upper level, full-height windows sheltered by the roof's overhang provide the dining area ...