A picturesque lake in Hampshire, England, is the setting for this fisherman’s hut by Niall McLaughlin Architects, which can be opened up in summer time and battened down in winter (+ slideshow).
Named the Fishing Hut, the wooden construction provides a location for the client to his store boats and fishing tackle, but also functions as a shelter and meeting area for local anglers throughout the summer fishing season, among April and September.
The intermittent use of the creating provided the starting up point for the layout. McLaughlin – an Irish architect based mostly in London – needed the structure to be totally open to the elements when in use, but secure and weatherproof for the rest of the yr.
It achieves this by way of a facade of wooden shutters, which fold up to allow views right by way of the interior.
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“It is closed for much of the yr and opens up for the fishing season, so it had to be a closed and protected agricultural shed, but then also a pavilion for fishermen to seem out in excess of their grounds,” the architect informed Dezeen.
“We sought a kind of shutter that gave the least visual intrusion on the constant horizon,” he extra.
“By horizontally pivoting the shutters upward from the eaves the enclosure disappears, leaving you on a deck over the water beneath the pitched roof.”
Fed by a typical Hampshire chalk stream, the lake is a natural habitat for migrating eels, brown trout and other freshwater fish. But it is truly manmade, built as component of a fish farm.
The opportunity to develop a cabin above the water presented itself in 2011. The banking institutions of the lake had deteriorated and silt had constructed up, so it was drained to allow repairs to be created. So at the identical time, 18 concrete pad foundation had been cast on the lakebed.
A steel frame was then created above the foundations, delivering help for a timber floor and a glue-laminated oak superstructure. Oak panels line the interior, whilst the pitched softwood roof is covered with a more durable layer of aluminium.
The team deliberately left some sections of wood untreated, so that the exterior will steadily take a silver tone, although the interior will retain its golden hues.
“I imagined a fisherman rowing across to the developing on a misty morning,” explained McLaughlin.
“The exterior oak will have weathered to grey,” he continued. “But as the shutters open up, they will be warm gold on the underside and they will be doubled by a reflection in the nonetheless water.”
In program, the cabin is divided up into ten bays that every measure one.eight metres broad. Some are enclosed, even though others form open decks that are sheltered beneath the overhanging eaves.
A loft provides storage spaces for boats, freeing up the primary floor to accommodate a kitchen and dining space, a tiny reception area and a toilet. There is also an external shower and a covered mooring.
Niall McLaughlin Architects is primarily based in Camden, north London. Other tasks by the studio contain an elliptical stone chapel close to Oxford and a property in southern Ireland developed from Irish blue limestone.
The Fishing Hut was completed in late 2014. It has because won the RIBA Stephen Lawrence Prize 2015, which awards projects constructed for less than £1 million, and lately picked up 1st prize at the annual Wood Awards.
Photography is by Nick Kane.
Place strategy – click for larger image 
Floor plan – click for more substantial picture 
Roof program – click for more substantial picture 
Lengthy segment – click for greater image 
Cross section – click for bigger image 
