Elevated 5’ off the ground, the house includes 100 feet of uninterrupted glass – 50 feet spanning the length of the front and rear facades, with four sets of sliding glass doors that allow the house to be entirely open when desired. The house includes 800 sf of outdoor living space, with front and back porches and shuttered doors along the front for added privacy and protection against the elements. These details, and the position of the house, which is at the center of a 330-foot long lot, allow the house to meld seamlessly with the site’s dense and lush native landscaping.
Exterior Siding: IPE The exterior (siding, fascia and columns) is clad in Ipe. This dense hardwood works best in the tropical climates where termites and heavy rains dissuade most builders from using wood at all. Flat River Woodworking in Fort Lauderdale assisted us in purchasing the wood and gave us access to its millworking shop after hours. We spent three weeks – working late into the evenings – running each board through the planer and joiner. The boards were ship-lapped, giving the exterior a more modern look than the board-and-batten style cladding. The front and back steps were also made of 3” x 8’ ipe boards. The thickness provides tremendous strength, prevents sagging, and enhances the aesthetic.
Exterior Shuttered Doors: WESTERN RED CEDAR We built sixteen shuttered doors along the outer edge of the front porch for added privacy and protection against the elements. The shutters make the space much cooler while also allowing for cross breezes when the sliding glass doors are open behind. We used Western red cedar – as the species is also weather resistant, but much more lightweight and easier to work with than Ipe. In this case, no stain was used. The intent is to allow the Ipe and the Cedar to age into a similar silvery gray color over time. The light that filters through the shutters during the day is stunning. At night, the shutters are aglow from behind, creating the sense of a magical Japanese tea house.
Flooring and Decking: WHITE OAK AND CYPRESS To seamlessly merge the indoors with the outdoors, we matched the interior flooring and outdoor decking as much as possible. The interior floors are 6” wide natural white oak floors, purchased directly from Tidewater Lumber, a saw mill in South Carolina. For consistency, we needed a light decking material, and opted for a select grade of cypress, purchased from a Florida based mill – Howell Logging, Inc. Both the interior and exterior woods were given the same color stain.
Kitchens and Bathrooms: AMERICAN CHERRY The species selection for the floors was predicated on the use of American Cherry for all of the other millwork inside. The American cherry had been provided by my husband’s father and uncle, who had amassed an incredible stock of cherry boards over the years, which they bought at auctions and stored in their barn in New Hampshire. My husband and his father loaded up the wood and drove it down to Miami at the onset of the project, and we milled each piece of wood as was needed. The Cherry wood was used for all of the door frames, interior louvered doors (designed to be the vented AC door and vented pantry door); bathroom and kitchen cabinets, and lightly oiled.
LIVING IN THE LANDSCAPE: Having studied the Tropical Modern models and the typology of the glass pavilion — and then integrating those ideas with new technologies — we were able to achieve a design that was not only livable but also one that had an immediate relationship with the surrounding landscape. Because of that, the selection of flora became as important to the architectural experience as the structure itself. The integration of low-tech sustainability measures that were reliant on natural systems received great attention as well.
Project name: Brillhart House
Architects: Brillhart Architecture – http://brillhartarchitecture.com/
Location: Miami, United States
Area: 1500 ft²
Year: 2015
Photographer:
Claudia Uribe – http://www.claudiauribe.com/
Bruce Buck – https://www.brucebuck.com/
Stefani Fachini – https://www.stefanifachini.com/
George Street Shuffle by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
#modernhouse #housedesign #foresthouse