This is a relatively young architecture prize of 40,000 euros, established by the Finnish Forestry Fund to encourage authors and groups in whose work wood is the main material. Renzo Piano was awarded the first ten years ago, among the laureates is also Peter Zumthor, and, as the Austrian press reports, now Hermann Kaufmann has received recognition on a par with world celebrities. At the ceremony at the Sibelius Palace in Lahti, the chairman of the jury, Professor Matti Rautiola, noted that Kaufman's architecture is based on functionality, an accurate understanding of the material, craftsmanship and delights in the harmony of proportions and details …
In fact, Kaufman has long gained professional prestige in Europe: every year he receives awards for buildings and books, makes reports at conferences, acts as a visiting professor at universities in different countries, and teaches in Munich. Its most famous object - the Administrative and Social Center in Ludeš - annually visits more than 150 excursions.
Hermann Kaufmann is known as a leading European wood construction specialist, although most of his projects have been carried out in the far west of Austria, in Vorarlberg. Kaufman's activities are associated with a genuine personal interest, which has successfully fit into the state program "House of the Future". As you know, this country does not have its own oil and gas, and the search for energy resources and savings have always been relevant, so one of the solutions was the direction in the construction of housing "passive house". It is based on the idea that it is infinitely impossible to consume: there is a limit to everything. Therefore, it was important to create such a resource supply system that works with the use of renewable energy sources and the laws of physics.
Research projects to study the passive house system have emerged in America and Europe since the early 1970s, and Germany has become a leader in this direction. In Austria, large-scale construction of such houses has been developing in recent decades. Although the European standard for "passive houses" includes brick and stone buildings, Austrians in principle build housing only from wood. The “passive house” lives off of regenerated types of energy: thermal, sun, wind and biomass (agricultural and woodworking waste). The enclosing structures of such a building have a high degree of thermal insulation. This is a house with low energy consumption - 10-15% of the standard costs for a building of a similar size.
Savings are collected from parts: for example, window frames are only wooden. In the window openings, double-glazed windows are installed with injected argon, which is most often neglected in our country. "Sandwiches" are prepared with machine-building precision: at the construction site, the "box" rises without gaps. Only natural materials are used as insulation: moss, cellulose, sheep wool - without chemical treatment, but thoroughly washed and dried. In such a house, solar storage batteries are installed - solar collectors and photocells, a self-regulating supply and exhaust ventilation system with re-use of heat, deep-well heat pumps.
This is how the administrative and public center in the small town of Ludesh was built from local larch. The complex is made up of three rectangular two-storey buildings, set on a common basement floor and having a common attic floor. Kurdoner - under a translucent roof made of modules with photocells: the electricity received from them is enough for the complex and even for neighboring buildings.
The residential complex "Mühlweg" in Vienna, designed by the Kaufman bureau, was recognized as the best wooden structure of the year in Austria. A complex of five wooden houses, again on a common concrete podium, was erected among the existing buildings of the 1960s. Simple shapes are enlivened by the play of light and shade on the planes of the facades, supported by the intense coloring of the sun shades.
Of course, the private customer also takes care of energy saving in Austria. One example is an individual house in the town of Frastanz, a minimalist object for an elegant life in nature. But not only housing and public buildings are built from wood in Vorarlberg. The industrial and warehouse complex Velderhaus near Bregenz includes a carpentry workshop, a finished goods warehouse, a shop and offices. Tape glazing surrounds the buildings along the perimeter, and the facades are vertically sheathed with clapboard. The semi-arched floors between the bodies add air and lightness. No compositional tweaks, the effect is reduced to the harmony of lines and material with the natural environment and space.
… Twice I managed to visit Vorarlberg and bring curious architects there, and among all the variety of impressions, the house of Hermann Kaufman himself remained a bright milestone in the memory. And warm. It is a long glass-wooden "bar": home and office at the same time. On the ground floor there is an office, on the second floor there are employees' apartments. The second floor overhangs the windows of the first: from the south side, from the courtyard, there is a significant ledge - the apartments open onto open terraces. The outrigger staircases are wrapped in a banner net, and there are two apartments on the site. The layout is almost enfilade: a large space is divided along its length by a low wooden partition and frosted glass into two parts: an entrance hall, a kitchen, a bathroom. The second part remains free, zoned furniture for the study, living room and sofa. At the end is the second room - the bedroom. In the office, there are slabs of pressed hay hanging from the ceiling; employees walk barefoot on the wooden floor in summer. The facades of the building are sheathed with plywood, which, of course, has turned very gray in ten years. However, this does not bother the architect Kaufman. In this part of Austria, where imperial ambitions did not reach, people's lives have always been determined by a sense of healthy practicality. One of the principles of the "passive house" is the easy replacement of any part of the structure, so that the worn-out part can be disposed of without harming nature. In addition, you can admire not only the gloss. There is a lot of aesthetic pleasure in watching objects age beautifully.
We then asked Hermann Kaufman what he thinks about it:
- If the wooden facade is soaked and faded (and we will not paint it, because we agreed not to use chemicals!), It means that it acquired its own face - natural, that does not need external evaluations. It all depends on the attitude. In such a house it is comfortable, comfortable already from the realization that you are not harming nature and your health.
- But, you see, in the era of global urbanization, preference is still given to other houses.
- Yes, everywhere old houses are mercilessly demolished in order to build new ones, which will be replaced tomorrow by even newer ones … It is very expensive. At whose expense? In the name of what? If this is just a beautiful experiment with forms, technologies and materials, then it is important to understand what is its global meaning? Well, not only in the assertion of their superiority? … It's just some kind of Olympic Games! While some people can set records in running, it is important for most people to experience the daily happiness of walking calmly.
Authors of the text: Marina Ignatushko, Natalia Kleist.
Authors and copyright holders of the presented photos: Marina Ignatushko, Architekten Hermann Kaufmann bureau, Nadezhda Schema, Yulia Nazarenko.
