A sculpture to live in

Titus Bernhard - Germany

Pushing the boundaries of design, and the sensibilities of the Local Government, Titus Bernhard has formed a uniquely solid building from the most fundamental of materials and an eye for the controversial

Titus Bernhard has attempted an architectural 'revolution' in rock - at least in terms of his immediate surroundings - with the construction of a family house in Stadtbergen, a suburban community outside Augsburg, Germany.

The two-story house, of minimal 9-meter cubic proportions, was designed to be a habitable sculpture. It encountered significant resistance from the local building committee and howls of protest from the neighborhood.

Howls of protest

Ironically, the actual stumbling block were built into the very fabric of the structure - around 40,000 Altmühltaler dolomite stones caged within some 365 steel baskets, weighing 28 tones. This shrouds the entire house giving it a solid, medieval look. The asymmetric pyramid roof is also constructed from of this material; the walls of the house stray seamlessly over the eaves of the roof, which is intended to appear as the fifth façade to the building.

Bernhard came up with this unique steel basket façade approach - which has so far been exclusively used for landscape architecture. The steel and stone structure is placed in front of the brick shell insulation. The entire shell of the building is built under the steel baskets and is designed to act as a water-bearing layer, which negates any need for gullets and gutter piping.

The façade does not only correspond to the credo of the architect - which is structural clarity and a single point of focus - but also plays a valuable ecological function. The 28 tons of boulders have formed a kind of ecological shell for the building, buffering the heat in summer and the cold in winter. This way the consumption of energy is reduced to a minimum.

Lighting devices

An attractive contrast to the rough shell of the building form is its interior lighting concept. On the 9x9 meter floor plan there's an open plan structure starting with a living room, dining and kitchen area on the ground floor, followed by a gallery, a bed- and dressing room and bathroom on the first floor. A library sits directly under the roof reached by a steep samba stairs. Axial views create a broad and light atmosphere and make the small house of 120m² take on a far wider, airy feel.

Completed in autumn last year, this innovative project was supported by many firms involved in the actual construction. Some took on large portions of the development and construction costs.

In the meantime, the community of Stadtbergen are still waiting eagerly for the house to be plastered and receive a corrugated iron roof. These further modifications had been demanded by the local building committee, which only allowed Bernhard's building a mere three years of exposure in its raw form. However, since his baskets began stacking up, the '9x9 Haus' has gained much acclaim in German architectural circles.

A winning entry

Highly praised by the press too, the project will take part in the Venice architectural Biennale in autumn as the official German entry.

When asked what made him take on such a provocative project which was bound to be misunderstood in some quarters, Bernard said: "I built this house with the intention of making an aesthetic statement against mediocrity and banal local architectural rules.

"Such a project needs a little personal ambition. It's fun to provoke in times of mediocrity. Loving ones profession is about getting the right perspective - content counts more than money. And besides, you can only be content within your profession when you utilize your full potential."