Connecticut Pool House | RESOLUTION: 4 ARCHITECTURE

Located in a natural clearing within a wooded hillside of northwestern CT, this watering hole serves as a sustainable entertainment and relaxation center from the hectic urban existence, a place to go from always being "on", to actually shutting "off" for a bit - a place to simply chill out. The 16 x 52 module contains a sleeping zone at one end of the module, and a food prep / consumption / digestion zone at the other.  In between sits a recycled black-steel core, a volume containing the bathroom, steam shower, laundry, storage, and a heat-generating fireplace.  Although 'floating' in the middle of the space and not connected to a perimeter wall, the core is filled with natural light from a skylight above and frosted glass pocket doors; an outdoor shower brought indoors.  

The single bar module is heated and cooled passively, via the expansive wall of sliding glass doors on one side and the continuous slot of operable windows on the other, as well as actively. The roof is designed for solar hot water panels used to heat not only the pool, but also the module, via radiant heat tubing beneath the bamboo flooring (this supplements the heat-generating fireplace).  Exceeding LEED standards, the perimeter envelope contains a special factory installed high-performance flash-n-batt insulation system, thus retaining heat longer and minimizing energy use, as well as keeping the house cool in the summer.  In the warmer months, cooling is passive and achieved via natural ventilation and evaporative cooling.  As breezes blow over the pool, water evaporates and cools the air as is blows through the expansive sliding glass doors, through the 16 ft wide domestic space, and out the continuous linear clerestory windows along the back of the house.  If that isn't cool enough, then go jump in the pool.