The cabin is a glowing jewel at night on a hilltop on the remote Keats Island in British Columbia, Canada.
The vertical, three-level cabin is compact in footprint, but maximizes every square foot.
The couple coveted this Percival Lafer sofa for years, and a friend eventually bought it for them as a gift. "I love those colors of the '70s. Nothing against modernism, to each their own but I wanted color, and so we leaned into that palette with this old, harvest gold leather," says Sean.
A lofted drawing studio features a sawtooth roof with expansive skylights that frame the branches of a jacaranda tree overhead.
The former garage is nestled amidst the landscape.
“Where we let loose was on the window,” Matt says. “It’s an aluminium window frame, which is bushfire compliant and easy to install, but the way that we detailed it was about hiding the frame so that the eye is drawn into the space.”
In the entryway, stained white-oak cabinetry provides a tidy place for shoes and bags. An unexpected but delightful moment of Brooks Thomas’ Martha Armitage wallpaper adorns the ceiling. The front door is a custom design.
A highlight of the overhaul is the floor-to-ceiling glass on the north side, which includes a five-panel bifold door. The door opens to the couple’s favorite area of the house, the backyard. The deck is shaded by the cantilevered roof, and Ren planted drought-resistant brush amid the existing oak trees.
"I aways wanted to have a proper shower outdoors. This was my little dream, you know, just showering with the sun,
"We wanted to have our storage open and visible, because I think the more visible something is, the tidier you keep it and you also don't buy loads of extra stuff,
“There are no cars, no people, no noise – at night and even during the day it's hundred percent silent,
The open doorway that separates the main living area from the kitchen used to be the entrance to the house. Back then, you had to go outdoors to access the open-air kitchen and bathroom.
Windows and glazing were one of the largest overall costs, setting Geo and Zoe back €10,306.
Verdant spruce clads the T-shaped plan, which has a pile foundation that minimizes concrete and wood fiber insulation.
The prefab design utilizes a pin foundation system that reduces the project’s carbon footprint by 77 percent, says Wittman.
The home is a near-even split of indoor and outdoor space.
In the living space, a custom sofa doubles as a pullout bed. An Aeris Cocoon bioethanol fireplace is suspended from the ceiling.
To meet the project’s sustainability goals and minimize impact to the site, the prefab was built off-site, has an impermanent foundation, smart-home controls, and a 4.1 kW solar array.
The prefabricated cabin consists of four modules connected by covered walkways. Each module has a dedicated purpose: living, sleeping/studying, energy, and outdoor dining. Connected to the sleep/study space, the energy module has a greenhouse and rainwater collection system.
Twilight
The owner, founder of Archistoric Lighting Studio, restored mid-century Danish light fixtures throughout the home.
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