Set on the escarpment of a 300-metre cliff, this holiday home exudes energy. “I would love to believe that all of the drama, the grace of the building is our work, but the setting plays such an important role,” says architect Christiaan van Aswegen. The house is low-slung and hugs the ground, with spectacular clifftop views.
As you cross the raised meadow of waving grasses from your point of arrival, the house forms a screen of sorts. It’s all part of what van Aswegen, calls “an unfolding sequence of spaces” or “architectural tantra”; a carefully choreographed progression as you arrive. From the meadow, you pass a pool and descend a few stairs onto a deck. “Then the surroundings really disappear because you are surrounded by the white walls of the house,” says van Aswegen. “The idea was that there would be a compression of space. Only once you enter the house do you get a glimpse of the view beyond, and then as you work your way towards the deck in front, it just expands and blows your mind.”
The house itself explores similar ideas to the Chandigarh furniture in its insistence on beauty and modernism combined with self-sufficiency and an appropriateness to its setting. “It was an opportunity to prove something that I feel very strongly about,” says van Aswegen, “that sustainability and green architecture can never be an excuse for not producing a beautiful building.” The house runs off solar power and stores and recycles its own water. It is entirely secluded and rural, but utterly modern.
View this beautiful architectural work in the gallery below.
Photography by Greg Cox.
