Category: Initiatives

In the forests of Gipuzkoa, a small hut with big ambitions

Posted on by eki

In the forests of Gipuzkoa, a small hut with big ambitions

Text: Christine Holmes Photos: Biderbost Photo
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The architects at Babelstudio in Bilbao have spearheaded an ambitious renovation project in the heart of the Sierra de Aralar, transforming a 20m2 tool shed into a cosy pied-à-terre.

Bringing some great ideas to life in a (very) small space: is this the architecture of the future?

In recent years, images of small huts in the middle of nature have invaded social networks, blogs and magazines. In a world teeming with information, people and pressure, the need for nature has, for many, become insatiable. This is what brought a creative couple from Bilbao to the offices of Andrea García, Michael Schmidt and Andrea Emmanuel, founders of the architectural firm Babelstudio.

Owners of a tool shed nestling in a wood in the Sierra de Aralar, on the edge of Gipuzkoa, they aspired to turn it into a place where they could enjoy a well-deserved weekend break, where they could do odd jobs, rest after a hike and even spend the night. The cottage designed by Babelstudio reveals all the ingenuity required in the architecture of small spaces.

“The professionals at Babelstudio therefore had to ensure that no unusable spaces were created, that every square metre was optimised.”

An optimised space that preserves the heart and soul of a cabin from yesteryear.
“The hut was in a serious state of deterioration,” explain the architects. “The structure had stability issues and the building’s envelope was neither insulated nor weatherproof.” In order to comply with current standards, they had to rethink the materials and structure of the cabin, while retaining its original shape and volume in the aim of creating a habitable cabin of 20 m2, no more, no less. The challenge was an appealing one: at a time when space and budgets are increasingly limited, the architecture of small buildings is the one that gives the greatest freedom to inventiveness and creativity.

The professionals at Babelstudio therefore had to ensure that no unusable spaces were created, that every square metre was optimised. This resulted in two spaces of equivalent size: the first, a cosy living room/bedroom around a stove, with large bay windows offering a glimpse of the surrounding greenery. The second has a small dry toilet and a carpentry workshop that literally opens onto the forest, thanks to a large door that takes up the entire facade.

A project that blends into its environment
Another architectural challenge that is equally in tune with the times is renovation with the greatest respect for nature. To achieve this, the creative minds at Babelstudio chose to use local pine for the floors, beams and interior and exterior walls. The roof is made of corrugated iron. A “raw” look that is nevertheless jazzed up by the black paint on the entire exterior of the cabin, which gives the impression of both a contrast and a fusion with the surrounding nature.

With this mini-cabin in the forest of Gipuzkoa, Babelstudio responds to our growing need not just to do well, but to do even better. Is the future small?

This book is an ode to the beauty of nature

Posted on by eki

This book is an ode to the beauty of nature

Text: Christine Holmes Photos: Lur Garden
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Iñigo Segurola’s book Lur Garden looks back at the genesis of his “garden of gardens” that he has been shaping for ten years in the Oiartzun valley.

But since a garden is nothing without its gardener, the Basque landscape designer also reveals a lot about himself. It is the story of a man in search of order and beauty in the heart of a free and indomitable nature.

As a child, Iñigo Segurola was one of those children who picked flowers on every school outing. He used to say that when he grew up, he would write “books about trees”. Already passionate about plants, he tells how moved he was when, in science class, the seeds he had placed in damp cotton finally germinated.

Fifty years later, he has created a garden that is unique in the Basque Country, an “oddity” in the local landscape. Above all, he has published Lur Garden, the “book about trees” he had dreamed of.

“I always say that this garden was like adopting quintuplets: when one sleeps, the other cries, another becomes uncontrollable, and so on,” – Iñigo Segurola

Lur Garden, the 10-year genesis of a book
Lur Garden is a collection of 16 themed gardens; a “garden of gardens” spread over two hectares in the heart of a small valley in Oiartzun. Some would say it is the Garden of Eden. However, when Iñigo Segurola and his partner Juan Iriarte found this land ten years ago, it was just a meadow where a few cows grazed, bordered by the Sarobe stream.

At the head of Lur Paisajistak since 1994, the visionary landscape architects of Gipuzkoa fell in love with the place and decided to acquire it in order to experiment with their art without constraints.

As the pages turn, Segurola reveals the stages of the project. We learn that the idea of creating a succession of round, rather than straight-lined, gardens emerged from Juan Iriarte’s sketch of a fried egg. Inspired by metal rings found on the site, Iriarte sketched a garden conceived not as an extension of a building, but as islands in the middle of nature.

The photographs, by Segurola himself and by Clair Takacs, Marta Etxebarria and Unai Bellami, offer a visual journey through these contrasting spaces. We meander from the garden of mirrors, soberly organised around a stretch of water devoid of aquatic plants, to the multi-coloured and luxuriant garden of extravagance.

Segurola opens the doors to his inner garden
Lur Garden is organised in two parts: the gardener and then the garden. For Segurola, the relationship between the two is visceral. “I always say that this garden was like adopting quintuplets: when one sleeps, the other cries, another becomes uncontrollable, and so on,” he says. The first eight years of this creation were like an obsessive relationship, in which he admits to having forgotten himself to the point of “hitting rock bottom”. He compares the garden to a child forever dependent on its parent.

Only yoga and meditation freed him from this interdependence and enabled him to rebuild himself. Rather than a Creator, he then took the place of an Observer in these gardens full of plants and animals, which in the end were not so dependent on him.

You can buy the book here!