Homestead on Hartovski vrh
Homestead and Meditation Center on Hartovski vrh was designed for Buddhist Center Zagreb, a community that wanted to relocate its activities (chan, yoga, meditation, healthy living, teaching) outside of the city.
A land was selected in the Nature Park Žumberak - Samoborsko gorje, far from built area, somewhere between settlements Hartje and Željezno Žumberačko. A multitude of the Center’s activities are distributed in five small buildings, which are carefully placed on a large plot, almost like 'scattered' villages in the area.
Four designs were developed. At first, everything was housed in large complex building. In the second solution, program was split in two buildings: large simple hall and small, complex residential building. In order to make spatial organization of every building simple, as well as to enable similar relationships between content and environment, in the third proposal program was divided in five buildings: residential building, refectory, multi-purpose hall and two dormitories.
The thesis that every content should have similar spatial characteristics was accentuated by a clustered spatial organization. Each building consists of several different 'houses': canopy, entrance area, restroom, main house and service house. Every 'house' is visible from outside as well as from the inside. The height of the cornice and the slope of the roof are the same in all houses, so by changing the floor proportions, height of the ridge and space height changes organically.
That type of spatial organization cancels division between 'served' and 'servant' spaces, in a way like each activity during meditative retreat is performed with equal focus.
All buildings and main entrance are connected by a circular pedestrian path that follows slope of the terrain. Near buildings, path spreads like a notch or embankment. Distance between buildings is carefully proportioned so as not to be disturbed, and in collaboration with the tall greenery they form spatial sequences.
A simple appearance without elements of scale makes buildings larger or smaller, even festive. Accordingly, precise finishes (folded sheet metal, larch boards) and monochrome paint scheme were selected.
Due to the fact that the Center is located in the Nature Park, thus from larger cities, light wooden prefabricated panels, quality thermal insulation and heat pumps were used, while photovoltaic plant is planned.