Architectural Association of Ireland (AAI) Awards 2020
The Ash House is located in South County Dublin, sitting on a mature and historical landscape. A stone folly structure integrates with the western boundary wall, while a large ash tree occupies the north east of the site bordered by an old orchard wall.
The design and placement of a two storey brick family home rationalises the large site plan into a series of terraced gardens, lawns and courts, while ensuring the mature ash trees root structure is protected. Brick paths circulate around the house, leading the individual through a succession of different landscapes to the eventual threshold of the house. Each facade responds to its orientation by either opening up to the view of the landscape or is manipulated in plan to afford the individual privacy in the form of perforated brick walls or timber screens.
Internally the house is finished in a simple palette of durable, natural materials. Hardwood timber panelling, muted white polished concrete, pale douglas fir boards and large fenestration accentuate the backdrop of gardens. The house steps in section internally with the topography of the landscape giving a sense of the external world while stairs connecting to the first floor creates an affinity with the ash tree orientating the climber. A double height space affords the individual an opportunity to look back over the dining space while roof lights are precisely positioned to exaggerate a feeling of being between walls continuing this embedded architectural language of wall and garden.