About an hour’s drive from Aarhus, Denmark, is the Helgenæs peninsula, a knuckle of land jutting into the sea that’s all fields, farms, and fishing villages. It’s here that architect Thomas Bossel purchased land six years ago, and where, more recently, he completed a cabin and studio for himself, his girlfriend, Louise, and their now eight-month-old daughter, Nora. For the design, he simply looked at what was around him.

“The little houses out here have a lot of history,” says Thomas. “Over time, they would change or get bigger, but not uniformly. There’s a certain charm and authenticity about that.”

Since buying the wooded site, Thomas slowly built his own interpretation of the region’s vernacular by adding, modifying, and adjusting as he went along. “I built a lot more of it myself than I expected,” he laughs. “I consider it a continuing education.” Now finished, the 882-square-foot cabin and separate studio feature layers of intentionality wrought over the last six years.

For the cabin, Thomas created a trapezoidal floor plan that was “dictated by need,” he says, to achieve the right balance in the spatial arrangement. Under a gable roof, the interior volumes shift, creating moments of compression and release. The entry is narrow and tall, while the kitchen, defined by a black block that frames a horizontal window above the counter, is more low-set. In the dining area, a row of sliders and a vaulted ceiling create a wide-open feel. Just beyond is a step up that leads into the wood-paneled living room, made cozy by the downslope in the ceiling, a perimeter wall that angles in, and built-in benches that surround a wood-burning stove.

The material palette of pine and concrete is purposefully modest and spare. “I am a romantic," Thomas says. “Not everything has to be luxurious; sometimes things can be more down to earth.” At the entry of the home is polished concrete, which wraps the board-formed concrete core of the house. (The sleeping and bathing areas, plus the attic, are within the core.) Just past the bedroom door and firewood storage, the floor becomes knotty pine planks identical to those used on the walls.

Throughout the cabin and studio space, details are arbitrary and imperfect; “cultivated” and “refined” were not part of Thomas’s building vocabulary. Edges of board-formed concrete are uneven, hand-built wooden furniture has bits of concrete stuck here and there, and pockmarks riddle the scored concrete path. Still, Thomas asserts that although “nothing is perfect, it is all harmonious.”

“Not everything has to be luxurious. Sometimes things can be more down to earth.”
—Thomas Bossel, architect and resident

There is richness in the project’s contrasts. Thomas juxtaposes not just the colors of the interiors and exteriors, but the character of both the cabin and studio within the wooded setting. From the outside, the structures are anonymous as they blend in with the surrounding greenery. Inside, the walls, clad with pine boards replete with knots, invite the eye to linger. “As a child I stared at wood ceilings, seeing faces, giraffes, and ostriches,” Thomas recalls.

All the senses come into play at this getaway. Thomas and his girlfriend, Louise, can hear the rocks clank with the waves. When water from the sink spills down the kitchen cabinets, it awakens the scent of pine. The foliage that surrounds the home creates an ever changing display of shadows on the interior walls. “Material and light is the poetry of architecture,” says Thomas. “It speaks to you. The house is alive.”

Related Reading:

A Cedar-Clad Cabin With a Glass Sunroof Rises on a Hillside in Norway

A Writer’s Copper-Clad Live/Work Space Blends Into the Forest in Denmark

Project Credits:

Architect of Record: Pax Architects / @pax_architects

Landscape, Lighting, and Interior Design: Pax Architects

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An Architect Takes His Time in Building a Cozy Cabin in the Danish Countryside