FOREST LAKE HOUSE
Lee, Massachusetts
The Berkshires Mountains of Western Massachusetts are surrounded by forests and spotted with lakes and ponds. We were offered the challenge of designing a house for a for a couple with an extended family, with the need for spaces to be used privately and in communion with family and friends. Our strategy for working on this small site was to upset the existing foliage as little as possible and use it to inform the shape of the building. We worked to preserve an existing maple tree in the center of the rear yard and used it as a “pivot” point for the design.
We separated the program into two “zones,” residential and public. Were the two sides meet, the building pivots a minimum in order to maximize the rear yard’s Southern exposure. Passive House detailing was employed to create a super insulated, air tight building resulting in interiors that maintain a constant temperature and humidity level while minimizing energy use.
Interior
spaces hold views of the lake and forest while providing comfort and functionality. Windows provide frames of discovery and create pauses through space, pulling you in and away, creating tension between intimacy and distance, inside and outside, silence and sound. The light shimmers off the lake into the interiors which are activated by trees which give shape to the sound of the wind.