Project Name: Izbushka
Location: Cherepovets, Russian Federation
Client: Living Steel
Type: Single family house
Architect: Tengiz Alaverdashvili
Design Period: 2008
Status: Concept proposal
Publications:
Concept:
Project concept comes out of the specific climate of Cherepovets. The aim is to use maximum solar energy. Outer walls consist of two layers. The outer layer is made of glass and supporting metal structure. This glass shell lets the sun get inside the house. The second layer is made of metal structure and partly of glass (where necessary) and partly of metal sheets. Project concept is to use thermal and physical characteristics of metal. Metal worms up and cools down quickly. Metal Sheets which are placed inside of the outer glass shell are wormed up by the solar energy. As the metal sheets are placed inside the house the thermal energy they loose while cooling down stays inside of the house. Metal sheets are dark colored. This increases the coefficient of the received solar energy. Between the façade layers are placed curtains (where necessary) providing shade in summer. It is also possible to use in some places colored (orange, red or yellow) glass which will provide additional psychological warmness. Steel columns (which are placed between outer and inner shells), beams and rafters serve for the main structure of the house. This enables to avoid using columns inside the house and gives much more freedom in interior planning design. The house structure consists of modular elements. Making the basic elements modular makes them easy to produce with low prime cost. It is very effective to construct with them conserving a lot of time. The elements are also easy to displace (if necessary). Based on the main concept various designs can be made. For the visual prototype of the house served the traditional Russian house called izbushka. Although the total difference between their construction and materials there are a lot of similarities.
