Huis aan ‘t laar | 51N4E

Situated in a beautiful forested area, sits the Monnikenheide Campus for disabled people. Over the years the campus has grown, pavilion after pavilion, into a loose ensemble of some ten units. The Huis aan ‘t Laar is the latest pavilion to be build, holding two groups of each 8 relatively autonomous people and their assistants. The hidden duality of the building is only revealed at the sole point of contact between the two groups: a double staircase. The two housing groups are mixed and intertwined within a solitary object, sculpted by the trees. At some places additional distance allows sufficient daylight. All views are filtered through the pine trees. Each room is situated on a corner condition, allowing for each room to hold two different views, light qualities and scales. The seemingly meandering and haphazard hallway spaces are the casted outcome of the room’s configurations. To obtain a maximum synthesis between the house and the forest environment, the façade’s cladding is foreseen in burned pine wood. This ancient Japanese technique offers not only a natural way to sustain the wood; its black scorched surface reflects the filtered forest lights in a very generous and natural way. Belonging to the campus as much as to the village, this calm, sober structure challenges institutional clichés associated with health care architecture.