Portfolio

getting started. 1st year

It has been quite a year. So many things have changed! I will post update on my first work experience as an architect in a separate post. Nevertheless, I have quit my first job last year and moved on. With an upgrade, I have been earning better and have more spare time, so I have decided to invest into my own project.

It is no secret that I come from Slovakia and currently live in Germany. Spending Christmas in white or going for a nice hike in summer while visiting my parents is a part of my long term vaccation program. Thinking forward and starting a family of our own in close future, it have always wanted to buy a nice house there. Somewhere quiet, somewhere close to the mountains I grew up in. So I have been looking into housing market in Slovakia for some time. Year after year, I have been noticing that the prices are rapidly growing. So when I the positive change came, I have acctually made some appointments last Christmas.

January 2019

My target was an old house with a nice garden and reasonable price. My taste is quite particular and as I have some experience with construction sites, I have been looking forward to the carrying out the project on my own (and with some professional help). By accident, we came across the “ružový domček” in a small village underneath the Low Tatras. The price was plaing along and it was the perfect fit. So, I returned to Slovakia by end of January to sign the contract and get measurments of the house. Two months later, it was offical and I have become a new house owner. The planing process was in full bloom.

July 2019

The main house (60 sqm) was build in 1928-30 and it has a unique character. There was not much of furniture as it was uninhabited for over 20 years, yet we found some amazing documents of the former owner in the attic. It was made with astonishing precision and vaulted ceilings. I think that ist one of my favourite feature about it! So, when drafting new plans, I have always kept it intact. On the other hand, I have been dreaming of a modern livingroom with tilted roof. To combine those and get a use out of the attic we will have to expand (deconstructing the vaulted ceining to insert a staircase into it was not really an option). With preliminary draftes in hand, a short trip to the authorities to get the next steps straithened out was in order. This was my first time to see the place/ garden not covered in snow and I enjoyed little downtime in my new hammock.

September 2019

As my savings went into the house itselft, I have been saving up these days for reconstruction while paying back the loaned money to my parents. Nevertheless, we have decided to take two weeks off and invest some time and manual labour into the house getting it ready for the reconstruction (removing wall plastering, the cracked chimney and cleaning the attic). It was a great break from planing! We also had a ground surveyor to stop buy and get measurements/ heights of the plot. There are some pictures of shovel power in the gallery below.

December 2019

Revealing some secrets underneath the plaster, we have found out that the non-bearning walls are acctually bearing after all. We have been assuming that the vaulted ceiling is suppoted by steal beams (in our case railway tracks). Yet, the arched spans in marginal fields deviate from the others and we did not find any beams in those axis. The strange thins is, that 14 cm thick brick walls (compared to 46 cm of outer shell!) are in fact load bearing. What is more, they acctually built load distributing arches above the doors which also confirms the thesis. All in all, the concept has to be changed again.

Preliminary design

..coming soon.

Gallery 2019

Horehronie valley

livingroom is ready

bare bones of the house

garden at dusk

landscape planing

cleaning out the attic took a while

ready to be disposed

December 15, 2019 0

Housing Project No. 14

This post has to be modified (31.05.2018) due to issues with copyright after I quit my job. My former boss made clear, I am not allowed to use any of data in my portfolio. I will tell You more over here [1].

It is funny, the last finished project was acctually No. 13 [2]. Now, to keep things organised, I am moving up to Project No. 14 – the best German clishe of all times 🙂

I have always liked reconstruction projects better than doing new designs. As I am not crazy creative, I like to have a starting point when drafting an approach. It is easier to find it, if you do not “cook only from water” [3] So, having to work with an old core is always a fun for me. What is more, you have during the transformation process the great dynamic of old/new.

First step, building survey – it is kind of spooky, yet so much fun for me. I loved spending semester breaks with head in ancient buildings (I should make a post on this!). Measuring and drawing, measuring again, and again. Trying to sneak in some quiet time and produce plausible plans can be hard, especially if you have to supervise two other active sites. Nevertheless, at some point I have finished and moved on to the second part – negotiating with building authorities what could be aproved. Recently, the building permit has been released and we are preparing the implementation these days.

DRAWINGS, PLANS and GALLERY

Cannot be published.

[1] read more here very soon

[2] link here

[3] to cook only from water – it is a weird slovak expression translated literaly. Imagine, you are trying to cook a soup, yet the only ingredient you have is just water. You can only wonder, how tasty it will get in the end 🙂

February 15, 2018 0

(my) First Housing Project

Starting a new job two years ago [2], preparing and submitting an application for building permit was one of my first tasks. It took a while to polish the details and sign contractors – after a year of preperations, we were good to go. Quite enthusiastic, I emerged myself in regular site visits – coordinating subcontractors, material logistic and ensuring general progress. And I think I grew few grey hairs this past year. Nevertheless, I am glad to say, I have just finished my first housing project!

The design is not ground breaking, the general layout was already drafted before I started. What is more, we were building based on existing zoning plan and there were lot of other restrictions, e.g. the facade colour determined by the department of preservation of historical monuments – despite the fact, it is a new building. Welcome to Germany.

It is quite fascinating to look back and see how I put few abstract plans into real shape and watched to grow a real house in front of me. I guess, I did learn something and I would have done so many thigns differently now. Nevertheless, it turned out quite OK and the first tenants were so happy! And that is only thing what counts in the end.

DRAWINGS, PLANS and GALLERY

had to be removed.

[1] read more here very soon

[2] read more here

museum design (2nd year)

TASK

design a museum using contrasts of light materials and mass

LOCATION

somewhere in swiss mountains (without any further specifation)

FOCUS

mass, concrete, wood, light

IDEA

Designing a robust concrete shell to withstand the rough outdoors and playing with wooden elements floating inside to present the artefacts. Arraying a set of shells along the edge and opening them up to the south in common area, yet facing nothrern light when exhibiting sculptures. The lower floor with painting exhibition stays completely hidden inside of the hill.

GALLERY

October 31, 2016 0

summer house on the skerries (2nd year)

TASK

Filled with the impressions of ferry ride through skerries during the excursion in Scandinavia, design a simple summer house.

LOCATION

skerry coast somewhere in Scandinavia (without any further specifation)

FOCUS

landscape interaction, light, views and connection, family time

PROJECT PARTNER (Models)

Luisa Schulz

IDEA

Emphasising the flat and scattered character of the coastline, yet setting contrast to the smooth washed out counturs of the rocks.

The summer house structure was broken into four funtional space units, arrayed on the ridge overlooking the bay and encosing a courtyard to offer a place to directly interact with outside, yet sheltering the inhabitants from cold wind. The horizontality of the landscape was underlined by the horizontaly streched windows to enable widened vistas.

GALLERY

scandinavian landscape of skerries

elevations

model

bird eye view of design

October 31, 2016 0

Breaking into real world

You might have noticed I have been working on my master thesis [more on the topic here] and the next logical step would be looking for a job. I am kind of lucky, I could skip that part as I have recieved an offer before I have got to the point of sending out applications – good score, right? Long story short, I have entered a student design competition last June. I have been quite happy with my contribution and so was the jury [more about the project here] and then, at the award reception, I have met my future boss. He was looking for an young architect fresh out of school to work on housing projects of similiar volumes. He runs a familly business, among others also a construction company located in Brandenburg [1]. I have been intrigued by this offer and have took a meeting with him. The point is, I have started my first real job on the 1st February and moved to a very small town (ca. 4.000 inhabitants) in eastern Germany. I have been working before – tutoring since my second year and I have had some other jobs in research as well. Hence, I have never had to leave the university bubble until now. I have spent last five years in Germany, yet I was not acctually living there. It has got better when I moved out of dorms but I was still meeting only students. Looking back, I seemed to have very strange priorities and problems. As the most students, I did not worry about buying matching furniture or having set of nice pots to cook in, anything clean worked just fine. I think this attitude is very reasonable – you have a limited budget, plus you care only about passing the classes and having fun. Yeah, I have been in that bubble for last five years. However, I think it is time to grow up for good, set up a saving account and buy those matching curtains. I will be earning good money, and have plenty of free time – maybe. I think going to work is not as time consuming as studies, you get at leas the weekends off. Therefore, it is an improvement comparing to my scedules when being to school, I have basically spent seven days either in classes or in studio. So, I have not had a free weekend in a long time.. and if I were to add the number of my pyjama lazy days in a year, I will certainly not go over the 25 (which is number of my vacation days in a year, and I did not include the state holidays!). I admit, it gets harder when you have kids but I am not even in a serious relationship yet. So, I will have the absolute freedom for the first time in my life. The strangest thing of all is, I am already looking for that boring life of an adult. After five years of rollercoasting, I was happy to dive into a routine – scedule regular workouts, plan my meals in advance and sleep properly. I was very excited and glad to abandon my college life (and have not regreted it yet).

It has been almost two weeks of work and I hold my head still up. I am constantly learning new things – it is kind of ovewhelming but I am getting the hang of it! I have had the first meeting with building authorities, they are not as scary as I imagined :). Everything is so real, I have had already two site visits – it is a housing project, redesigning an old villa. Very charming view, I would definitely want to move in! You can check out first impressions in the gallery attached below. What is more, I have spent last weekend at the Baumesse [building fair] in Chemnitz. I loved it there, and if you are a student, I would definitely recommend visiting these things – you will see plenty of interesting products there. If you are kind of hands-on-learner, it is a perfect opportunity to get in touch with the construciton world. They have so many samples there, it was very exciting.

Anyway, the working class has to do the dishes now, then some core training and get the eight hours of beauty sleep, so have a nice evening and stay tuned for more updates.

[1] Brandenburg is the flatest area in Germany, the land around Berlin.

GALLERY

February 11, 2016 0

Translocating heritage (5th year)

TASK

explore possible translocation of suspension bridge (1893)

LOCATION

Germany, Wetter (Ruhr)

ACCENTS

analysis, documentation and written assessment of historical structure, design of intervention, preliminary calculations

PROJECT PARTNERS

Nicole Sakrejz, Jennifer Stapel

IDEA

Proposing a translocation of an industrial landmark to reinforce the identification process of community with the heritage itself. The suspension bridge has been examinded thoroughly during the site visit in order to digitalise the technical drawings and understand its particularity.

Design on the new site is taking under consideration the original layout of the bridge construction. New additions are planned with caution and should enhance the essamble, not compete with it.

GALLERY

December 11, 2015 0

Master Thesis (5th year)

TASK

adaptive reuse of an acient monument in Italy

LOCATION

Castel Gandolfo, Italy

FOCUS

architectural survey and research, historical reconstruction, design, structural details, preliminary calculations

RESEARCH

Architectural survey on site and evaluation of measured data to determine the remaining substance of the Piscina Torlonia is followed by literature research on the history of the object and its former use and assessing the deterioration of structure. A possible construction process in the ancient time should be examined based on geometry of structure. Furthermore, the original design is visualised.

DESIGN IDEA

..is currently being developed.

GALLERY (the site)

GALLERY (new design)

November 28, 2015 2

New address (5th year)

TASK

design various housing units in a small town

LOCATION

Germany, Bad Liebenwerda

ACCENTS

short-term design, housing

IDEA

The new addition to the small town neibourhood is a complex of different typologies targeting three types of tenants – young couples, families, and elderly people. Each group has divers demands, yet they can benefit from sharing the joint space. Proposed layouts of units react on street-yard orientation of structure and so do the openings in the facades -opening up towards the courtyard and staying private when facing the street.

GALLERY