When multiple award winning architect Tom Kundig was studying to be a geophysicist he realised why that discipline was not for him. As he puts it: “I was just in the rational world of physics and I missed the poetic. Architecture lets me have both.” A stellar career has followed. Now a new book details his 462 projects. Many of them with his trademark link between the natural world and that of the human home. We’re great fans.
Take Chicken Point Cabin, an early work from 2002. Client brief for this lakeside site in rural northern Idaho was to be as accessible to the water as possible. Solution: a huge, hand cranked paned picture window, lake always visible and when opened, rather like a boat house. As the architect puts it: "Chicken Point Cabin is a tactile house that asks you to physically engage before it opens up, dissolving the boundaries between inside and outside.”
38 Kundig masterpieces in full
Thirty-eight of Kundig’s works are selected in the new book for a full, multiple illustrated analysis. They’re object lessons on how to meld effective, often minimalist living space - many are second homes, literal jungle escapes from urban concrete jungle living - with landscapes, trees, water, the planet. Like Chicken Point Cabin, one signature is sliding/pivoting/disappearing walls/glass to link the humans within to their planet beyond.
Summer or winter, Kundig’s Outpost in the remote desert of northern Idaho brings occupants face to face with the enormity of the landscape in which the dwelling is set. While from the approach the visitor encounters the simple concrete blocks of which Outpost is constructed, once in the main living spaces, elevated above ground, the view through huge glazing is almost overwhelming. Occupants are surrounded by unfinished wood, exposed brick, steel girders and of course a huge open fire. It’s all very primal.
All in the details
Pulleys - echoing that of Chicken Point Cabin - are key features of Rio House, set in the green landscape next to the Tijuca National Park near Rio de Janeiro. Here multiple gadgets open huge windows and manoeuvre walls so that the factory-like nature of the build is revealed. Entire ground floor can be open to the elements for languid evening meals almost-outdoors. Living areas above have views into the tree canopy and to key sights of Rio below. While concrete and steel feature, so do Brazilian wood and traditional stained concrete floors to link Rio House to its location.
If, like us, you can’t quite afford a bespoke forest-dwelling, lakeside, or desert-set house by Tom Kundig, then this book is obviously the next best thing. While we can’t put a price on your chosen one-of-kind piece of architecture, we can help with a price on Mr Kundig’s latest tome for your coffee table. Around £75 should do it, and we’ll be more than happy to drop around for cocktails to select our favourite Kundig house for you.
Next up: Blue Ridge House by Olson Kundig.
