Lattice house

3rd semester
Assignment: 
Part 1: find a site in Oslo which you somehow appreciate.
Part 2: Draw a house for yourselves at the site, no matter how challenging the site may be.
In collaboration with: Nhan Van Nguyen
Teachers: Espen Surnevik, Bente Kleven, Hans Bjørn Holter, Aina Dahle

The somewhat neglected square of “St. Hallvards plass” is a small, triangle shaped meeting point in Oslo’s old town. 

We chose the square as one of our favorite places in Oslo for its rather unintended patchwork of built history, running from medieval times right up to functionalism. It also has a quiet, perhaps somewhat isolated atmosphere, despite being a mere ten minutes walk from the central train station. Upon learning that we had to design for ourselves a house at the square, we decided to focus on the end gable of an apartment building, intersecting the unceremonious entrance to one of Oslo’s few remaining medieval church ruins.

The medieval ruins are located at the northern corner of the old apartment building. This necessitated a structural principal of compression rods in one end of the building, and tension rods on the other.  

To avoid privatizing the ruins we decided on a tall, thin floor plan (1.5 meters) and designed a series of interior solutions to make the narrow space more believable as a place to live. We concluded with a lattice construction which would give us privacy, ample storage space and a lamp like formal expression above the ruins at night time. The project was designed with the idea of acting as both a house to live in and and architectural office for me and my collaborator.

The living space is only 1,5 meters wide, but has an additional staircase section. 

Project location: