CASA BOSQUE
Upon arriving in Camprodon, we became aware of an excessive consumption of land. When we received the commission, we found that trees on the site had already been cut down, a vehicular track had been built halfway across the plot, and a flat platform, entirely alien to the natural contours of the site, had already distorted the original wooded topography.
We sought to reverse this aggressive approach to land development, typical of peripheral urban areas. We proposed restoring the original woodland—the only remaining patch among the surrounding developed plots—and occupying as little of the site as possible, allowing the future inhabitant to experience the genuinely wild character of the place.
The project restores the natural slope of the terrain. A strategic location for the house was identified just behind the shade of a group of century-old trees facing south, which fortunately had not yet been cut down. A subtle incision in the terrain provides access into the woodland with minimal impact. The final step will be to replant trees where the original ones were removed. Only then will our intervention have become truly silent.
At the heart of the project is a search for harmony with the time and character of the site. Cork, laminated timber and OSB panels seek to blend with the surrounding forest while reducing the building’s carbon footprint. A path made from recycled railway sleepers, wood shavings generated during construction and reused as insulation, and stones from the excavation repurposed as drainage for the roof all contribute to renaturalising the architectural intervention, with the aim of remaining within the environmental limits of the planet.
A 1.5 × 1.5 m structural grid, built from 160 × 80 mm laminated timber sections, creates an open framework of 24 modules. Vertically, the grid is separated by 2.5 m-high, 160 × 80 mm perimeter columns. A series of walls formed from the same timber sections is introduced in the central areas of the house to provide structural stability.
Within the grid, fixed enclosure elements are formed by OSB boxes filled with wood shavings and designed to simplify on-site assembly. Where the enclosure is omitted, sliding openings reinforce the transversal connection between interior and landscape. The entire system was previously tested in a prefabrication workshop. A self-build manual was also developed, suggesting the possibility of easily replicating and democratising the system in response to emerging ways of living.
The house is organised as four non-hierarchical spaces that can function interchangeably as bedrooms, living rooms or dining areas. In this case, only one of these spaces has been assigned a specific programme.
The service core is inserted between two of the three central walls. The resulting volume helps define a small entrance hall at the concealed access to the house and contains the bathroom, which receives daylight from two small skylights. On the opposite side, the volume opens to reveal the kitchen at the centre of the house: without gender hierarchy, facing the forest, beside the warmth of the fire, and responding to the challenges of the future.
