Guesthouse in a forest of oak trees 
Valojoulx, France
2022

* Title: Guesthouse in a forest of oak trees

* Address: Valojoulx, France

* Year of construction: 2022

* Thematic focus: Composing with the real, Reuse materials

* Project text: « What is an architect's ability to put down roots in a traditional building culture and find creative inspiration there? Vernacular building is made up of repeated models and technical gestures; it also illustrates the subjective approach to architecture, that which is at one with the environment. We support the architect's role as "country doctor" in these areas between urban and rural, and keep a safe distance from the conventional, enslaving and impoverishing discourse on architectural frugality and pastiche. « Our projects enter into conversation with their sites, neither pastiche nor exogenous. »

In the village of Valojoulx, in the southwest of France, we completed a stone, wood and glass "cabanon" nestled in the oak forest. The order was simple: a reception house, sometimes for guests (high season), sometimes for artists in residence (low season). Inserted in the slope, the building plants its powerful gables in local stone to the east and west and unfolds large glass surfaces towards the forest, sectioned with wooden mullions. The common room is located on the upper garden level; it rises above the slope and offers a panoramic view of the trees. On the lower garden level, the individual night spaces replicate this generous opening onto the vegetation. The connection with the environment is never lost, making the rustling of leaves, the variations of light, the calm flow of time, sensitive. It is thanks to this ability of the architecture to resonate with the place and the memory, to link times, that the architects shape a heritage continuity. Yet they do not hesitate to use contemporary materials: steel for the windows, grey corrugated iron for the gable roof, whose color will mimic that of the lauze stone of the neighboring buildings over time. Fruit of reality, the architecture wants to have the force of the necessity: it could not be transposed elsewhere. »

Text description provided by the magazine Le Festin #118 - Été 2021 and written by Julie Gimbal.

01 Why is the project particularly relevant for PIONIRA?

Because this project is about doing better with less.

02 What have you learned from the project? What challenges did you encounter, and how did you solve them?

We were working on this project in an environment of incredible strength : a forest of old oak trees with three stone buildings from the walls to the roof.

The main challenge was not to distort the existing environment.
The new building had to have a particular, elemental strength, to be at one with the form and history of the site, to simply be there and not be noticed.

03 What advice could you provide, based on the project?

We love this quote from Glenn Murcutt:
"In life, most of us will do ordinary things. The most important thing about doing ordinary things is doing them extraordinarily well, and being free to go to the beach without anyone knowing who you are. »

04 How would you like to build in the future?

We're keen to extend the notion of heritage, from protected historic monuments to the whole built and plant world.
This doesn't mean we have to keep everything, but we do have a responsibility to question what's already there, to question all the subjects we're called on to work on.

And in this sense, the transformation of buildings becomes a veritable field for the reconquest of architecture, a stimulating field of experimentation, a learning space for the invention of new local places, a tool for architectural and urban design.
Simply a tool for developing our ability to act on our built and landscaped environment.

Name: Guesthouse in a forest of oak trees 
Location: Valojoulx, France
Text and images by: Sapiens Architects
Type: Places
 
Posted: April 2024
Categories: architect, localism, raw materials, reuse, France

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