Woodstock, Vermont
Architecture | Birdseye |
|---|---|
Landscape | Wagner Hodgson Landscape Architecture |
Environmental Design | Atelier Ten |
Building | Birdseye |
Photography | Jim Westphalen |
Completed | 2019 |
Type | Single-family Residence |
Recognition | 2019 AIAVT Honor Award |
A carbon-neutral residence evoking the agrarian aesthetic of rural Vermont.
The main floor features an open living arrangement in a minimalist palette of exposed steel, plaster, concrete, and curtainwall with expansive and uninterrupted views beyond. The concrete walls extend the living space outside with decks, a green roof, hot tub, and fire pit. Inside, a central freestanding steel staircase provides a sculptural pathway to the ensuite bedrooms above.
Bank Barn required intensive energy consultation and modeling as a central element of the design process. Early on, the house was modeled to assess the design in terms of energy efficiency, thermal comfort, and visual comfort. This modeling determined the exterior envelope features and performance requirements, including thermally separated R-40 walls and an R-60 roof, closed-cell polyurethane foam cavities, target air-tightness of 0.6 ACH @50 pascals and a high-performance, triple-glazed curtainwall with a specified 0.15 u-value. As the design developed, the residence was additionally analyzed to help determine the mechanical system design and specifications, both from an annual energy usage perspective and from a life-cycle cost analysis. The final design, an electricity-based energy system with geothermal heating and cooling through water-to-water and water-to-air systems as well as heat recovery ventilators, was peer reviewed to confirm equipment sizing and performance. The project was designed to be a net-zero residence pending a future 18kw solar array.
