Contemporary German Forest Chalet by dmvA

What do you do when you crave an update to your contemporary house design but sorely lack space? You take a cue from the incredibly talented German team at design studio dmvA, who managed to expand and upgrade the vB4, an existing residential structure, all in a measly 26 square meters. To make matters even more complex, the building site is located at the heart of a deep forest, prompting municipal authorities to enforce very strict building regulations. In putting together the additional structure of the home, designers had to be very mindful of the forest’s eco-system. They were not allowed to cut off too many trees, nor were they permitted to come up with a design that would stand out negatively in the midst of this serene forested landscape. The result? A modern residential building, whose overall design still manages to recall a classical chalet. As for the interiors, you can admire the pictures and come up with your own conclusions.

Contemporary house design principles heavily encourage the use of the color white, which manages to make any interior, no matter how petite, look spacious, luminous and airy. Other tenets employed, according to the project’s developers, included creating a floating volume to amend the existing structure, entirely built of trapezoidal pieces of wood. The new timber elements, which closely follow the pre-existing frames and studs, connect the old and the new spaces via a library, washroom and entrance area. The exterior was reclad in black stained siding positioned vertically, in order “to create a similar repetitive motion as the surrounding forest”. And, of course, since the home is located in a forest, there was no way the architects could forget about the view. To this end, they added a movable glazed partition at the rear of the home, allowing for unhindered views of the surrounding natural landscape.

(Source: dmvA-Architecten.be)