Luca Selva Architekten
Courtyard House
best architects 22 in Gold
single family homes
Place
Basel, Switzerland
Studio
Photos
Yohan Zerdoun
Description
Chamber music in the courtyard
Here, in the Gundeldinger quarter in Basel, a former
storage shed from the beginning of the twentieth century has been re-used and
changed into a triple-storey residential building, which responds to the
existing three-sided firewalls in a spatially exciting way. Thus, the new timber
building partly rests against the firewalls, touching them at some points and
at other points detaching itself from them completely. In this way, luxurious,
high-quality and intermediate spaces open up, offering a spatial configuration
that is completely new for courtyard buildings. The programme accommodates a
granny flat on the ground floor and one flat on each of the two upper floors,
which are designed differently across courtyards and terraces. The construction
is a pure timber building; the floor and ceiling soffit are identical, thus emphasising
the horizontality of the interior spaces. The cladding of darkened copper expanded
metal with floor-to-floor bands continues this structure on the exterior.