The name Cool House is not associated with the cold color of copper, just the first word is part of the customer's surname. The house for the family of a top manager with two children is located in the very near Moscow region, that is, from it you can travel to work and study, and, therefore, live in it permanently. The house was built for 4 years. Around - an inhabited village with good landscaping and without high fences, so the front facades were oriented to the road. The house is one-storey. For some time ago, stairs were popular, but the fashion has passed, and you are reluctant to climb stairs to the second floor, and if the size of the site and the budget allow, it is better to freely move horizontally. So the volumes of the house are spread horizontally, in the spirit of the "house of the prairie", in the most important parts rising and acquiring a second light.
The house is very witty and well placed on the territory. In plan, it has the shape of an irregular cross and divides the garden into four unequal parts. In the largest part (the lower left corner on the plan), there is a ceremonial landscape glade on the relief, with a picturesque pond, lawn and trees, a gazebo, swings and other undertakings. There is something scenic in this glade. This is where the glass doors of the main rooms of the house: the living room, the master's bedroom and the nursery, from which the inhabitants of the house and guests can appear, like actors on the stage.
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zooming 1/3 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
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zooming 2/3 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
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zooming 3/3 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
The second part (upper left corner) is a quieter, secret family garden, with a secluded terrace where the exits from the spa and two baths (one inside the house, the other on the site) are oriented. The house becomes a natural border between different parts of the garden - and I must admit, this is a great way to avoid the gaze resting on the fence all the time, which would otherwise be inevitable on a plot of 23 acres. And in this way, pieces of the garden are formed, bordering on a variety of facades, many of which have panoramic glazing. That is, instead of a fence, you can watch the life of the house behind glass, as if you were in an atrium.
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zooming 1/4 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
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zooming 2/4 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
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zooming 3/4 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
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zooming 4/4 Site improvement scheme. Cool house © Roman Leonidov Architectural Bureau
The cruciform shape of the house also makes it possible to separate the entrance for cars on the right side of the plot. The entrance path rests against the garage, which is adjoined by the boiler room and other technical rooms with separate entrances. There is also the entrance to the house.
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zooming Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
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zooming Plan. Cool house © Roman Leonidov Architectural Bureau
The front part of the house consists of three blocks: public, children's and parental. The recreation area with an adjoining guest room is located in the back. The person entering and entering the site is greeted by a high public building with a lean-to roof-canopy, inside of which there is a large space of the living-dining-room-fireplace-kitchen. On the facade, you can see the main motive that gave the image to the house: a warm honey tree, juxtaposed with turquoise patinated copper. The accentuated contours of the roof and additional beams are balanced by white vertical corners and a black slate fireplace chimney. An additional middle beam appeared in order to strengthen the horizontals and give the composition a three-part structure. Roman Leonidov considers the principle of tripartite to be the most important for a private house.
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zooming 1/3 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
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zooming 2/3 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
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zooming 3/3 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
A similar image ("honey and copper"), but in a reduced size, marks the facade of the parent block: the same patinated copper and warm pine wood, the same horizontal lines, the same rise of the canopy roof. There, at the farthest end, in the most protected part of the house, is the master bedroom with a bathroom and an office.
Here I will allow myself a sociological digression. Christopher Alexander in his book "The Language of Patterns", a cult for architects, writes that in order to avoid quarrels, spouses need to each have their own personal space, plus space for two, plus a public space for the whole family. In Russian houses, there is usually only one office - for men. Boudoirs are rare. And where does the hostess work and come to her senses? But this is not a question for an architect, but for our gender reality.
Roman Leonidov explained the situation with the appearance of copper as follows: “In a conversation with the customer, it sounded that the house should be bright, joyful, warm. This means that you need a contrast, a cold accent. Against the backdrop of tinted turquoise copper, the honey tint of the wood becomes even warmer. " In addition, "copper allows you to keep the flanks, flank the building."
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zooming 1/3 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
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zooming 2/3 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
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zooming 3/3 Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
The lower building connects the public and parental part with the children's rooms. In terms of themes, it is less saturated than facades with copper, and looks like a transition between them. Here, on the initiative of the customer, brick appeared - the fifth material (color), which the architect considers to be superfluous, although he admits that the materials added tactility to the house.
“After this house, I wanted to leave the finishing materials in white architecture, in monochrome. The "white period" is already underway, and there will be a result in two years. Such volumes look good either completely in black or completely in white. Cool House'e has enough plastic to make it white. He would have won in compositional terms, would have been more integral. But I take into account what the customer needs."
In the architectural form of Cool House, one can observe the musical principle: the exposition of the main theme "honey and copper" is in the main public building, then the middle part, the children's building, in other materials, and the repetition of the theme, a reprise, in the parent block. Another place where "honey and copper" sounds is the guest room, which opens onto a small garden at the back of the house.
The house has many terraces. The building is surrounded by a platform, which, expanding, turns into a covered terrace near the living room and into a spacious area behind the house. And on the flat roof of the children's building, recreation area and the roof of the garage, there is another terrace, half wooden, half grassy - in fact, another glade with views of the surroundings.
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zooming Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
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zooming Cool house Photo © Roman Leonidov
In a volumetric composition, the horizontal lines are emphasized. One of them wraps around all the facades with a yellow ribbon, tying together the public, children's and parental buildings. Roman Leonidov sees horizontals as a necessary and natural condition for private housing. The spirit of Frank Lloyd Wright, although without direct quotes, is felt, and Roman Leonidov himself likes to repeat: "We are all wounded by Wright." The great American architect, both in his early and late work, avoided archetypal housing with pronounced pitched roofs, windows-eyes and door-mouths, he built parallels of roofs, windows and stylobates relative to the ground, and replaced anthropomorphism with landscape. Likewise, Roman Leonidov, with all the diversity of his houses, remains faithful to the horizontal approach in private housing projects.
