Bolton Residence

Having bought a beautiful plot of wooded land in Quebec’s Eastern Townships, the client dreamt of building a country house that would be in perfect symbiosis with its natural environment. This rugged, sloped site came to a natural plateau just below its highest point, becoming the perfect location to erect the house. The house is characterized by two stacked volumes; a wooden clad volume anchored into the mountain supports a cantilevering ground floor volume above. This gable roofed volume raised into the air gives the sensation that the house is floating amongst the trees. Vast views of Mount Orford and the valley below are framed by a long horizontal strip window. The kitchen and master bathroom are carved out of a black volume at the center of the house dividing living spaces from the master bedroom....

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Lajeunesse Residence

We were hired by a young couple to do a complete renovation of a house built by the clients grandfather, now housing its third generation of the same family. They wanted to combine the two existing apartments into a single family house on two levels. Their request was that we created something modern and bright. Due to the noisy street at the front of the house, the main living spaces were placed at the back facing north creating the challenge of bringing direct sunlight into these spaces. A double height light-well topped with a skylight, aids in bringing light to the centre of the house. On the ground floor, a wall of translucent sliding panels protects the living spaces from unwanted gazes from the street as well as acting as a vestibule in winter. A plywood handrail wraps around the stair and folds at the base becoming a long bench for...

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Chambord Residence

The client wanted to utilize the second storey of her 1920s duplex by converting her former rental unit into 3 bedrooms and an office space. While the grey-stone front facade only required minor restorations, the back of the house was transformed completely. An emphasis on transparency creates constant visual and physical connections with the backyard. A cedar clad volume, containing the master bedroom, punches through the glass exterior wall and cantelivers over the backyard, sheltering the patio below. The wood cladding continues through to the inside, blurring the boundaries between interior and exterior....

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Alexandra Residence

The client’s priority was to maximize the natural light in their new live/work house in Montreal’s Mile-Ex district. This was made challenging by the east-west orientation of the infill lot. However, our design fills even the core of the house with light through the implementation of a 2 storey light-well which runs the length of the southern side of the house. Additional light is reflected into this light-well by the client’s office space, a white volume that sits atop the northern edge light-well. Spaces on the second storey also benefit from the light well’s luminosity; the walls adjacent to it are fully glazed and a floor to ceiling piece of frosted glass brings a very soft light into the bathroom. The expressive back facade of the house is defined by the angular geometry of the floating steel box. The front facade, however, is composed primarily of bricks to conform with the heritage character of the neighbourhood. Two disjuncted apertures break...

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Sorel Residence

We were faced with the challenge of designing a contemporary single-family home in the middle of suburbia, amidst a sea of Victorian-inspired houses. The client purchased a vacant lot in Sorel, a suburb of Montreal, to be close to her family. She imagined a house that would stand out from its surroundings. The form of the house was created by offsetting 2 rectangular bars in plan, bridging over them with a gable roof and chamfering the corners. These chamfered cuts in the roof both create dynamic angular perspectives and create intimate covered exterior spaces such as the front entry and the screened-in porch. A small footprint was used on a generous sized site, leaving the existing trees undisturbed. The house was oriented perpendicular to the road, creating a semi-private wooded garden on the north side of the house. Southern light is brought in by two majestic skylights positioned at the center...

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8E avenue

This intervention transformed a residential two storey duplex in Rosemont into a single dwelling unit by completely reorganizing the interior and constructing a 430 sqft extension in the rear. The extension includes a master bedroom on the second floor and a family room that gives onto an intimate garden at ground level. Standing proud on a typical Montreal laneway, the extension acts as a beacon of novelty and dynamism. While little work was done to the front facade, this extension was designed in contrast, with bright colors, an angled form, and generous glazing. Work on the interior centered on exposing and highlighting the beauty of existing wooden structural walls and beams and supporting them with a more subtle pallet of materials. Natural daylight is brought into the core with a large skylight and glass floor placed at the center of the house....

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Connaught Residence

The changing needs of a growing family triggered the complete reconfiguration and extension of their existing 1950 concrete house. They wanted a contemporary extension that would harmonize with the modern spirit of the original house. The extension fills the void created by the split level of the existing house and is capped on either side with generous glazing. The living areas of the ground floor are distributed around a central core that has become the new focal point of the house. The new master bedroom found on the the second floor is secluded from the children’s bedrooms and accessed by a glass catwalk spanning the entrance of the home.   "The house feels at times large and majestic; at times warm & intimate, all seemingly dependent on one’s current vista and mood.  This transformative nature allows for the house to feel open & free flowing, but for privacy to be nothing more than a forgotten pocket...

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La Sentinelle

After selling their previous country house because of the lack of natural light, a couple and their 3 kids decided to buy an empty lot and build a custom home to better suit their needs. They found a parcel of land with southern exposure at vast views of the lake ‘Lac-de-la-Cabane’. The constraints of the site led to an L shaped footprint where an east-west oriented rectangular block was placed at the top of the topography, and a north-south oriented block was slid underneath. The upper block contains the living spaces and master bedroom, and the lower block, also known as the ‘kids zone’, contains the 3 children’s bedrooms and a games room. A folded roof rises from the lower block covering the upper block and extending towards the cliffs edge as if it were about to take off, reminiscent of the wings of a bird. We see the house as a bird sitting...

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Stacked house

This project was done in collaboration with the client who wished to build his own home. The site is located in a back alley of Montréal’s Plateau neighbourhood and the design reflects the patchwork of extensions and renovations typically found in Plateau alleyways. The constraints of the site called for a house that was built upwards versus outwards. Four boxes clad in different materials are stacked one on top of the other. A void carved out of the center of the house, provides daylight, ventilation, and private outdoor space.   ...

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Berri Residence

A couple with a passion for contemporary architecture wanted an extension to their 1940s duplex.  Their main desire was to create a dining room that would become the heart of the house, where family discussions would take place. The new dining room is located on the ground floor of the addition, just off the remodeled kitchen.  It has generous south-facing window and a large dining table in the center.  The master bedroom is located below the dining room overlooking the sunken garden. The dimensions of the glass panels have been pushed to their limits giving a sense of lightness and transparency to the extension.  It is clad with an olive green stained pine with an overhanging glazed volume covered in galvalum steel. "The generous glass area really opens up our house and make it seems bigger than what it really is and we often feel like we are outside. The trees in...

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