Why is it important to accurately model the land features of your project site with a toposurface?
For the hillside vacation house, the stacking of multi-story spaces is mostly affected by the topography. To maximize the available space and make sure the house structure is functional and stable, I need to decide on what part of the house will be underground if any will be. It is important to accurately model the land features since this will largely affect the construction of the base of the building, especially the part that’s underground or requires excavation. Failure to do so will greatly endanger the stability of the house, and negatively affect the rest of the design if the base level can’t be constructed as planned.
When designing a project...
- Should the building adapt to the terrain?
- Or, should you adapt the terrain to the building?
It really depends on the budget and the design of the building. For my project, since there isn’t a time or money budget in this design context, I can play around and prioritize aesthetic design over realistic structural feasibility and budget. For example, I made the half-basement a storage and pool/yard space. This is making the building adapt to the terrain, as a vacation house is the best when most living spaces are above ground with open view. By excavating part of the hill to build the foundation of the base-level, this is a form of adapting the terrain to the building. Having column structure on a hillside might be challenging to support a two stories stone/concrete house, therefore I made the decision to partially adapt to the terrain.
Describe a case when it would be worthwhile to create a new custom component in Revit… How do you decide when customize versus using readily available components?
I customized the U-shape staircase to best fit the corner after the entrance. This is because I already built the walls and planned the house dimension without considering the readily available stair dimensions. This also allows for optimization of the narrow space, as a straight one flight stairs will take a lot of floor space. I also customized the railing for the balcony fence and the outdoor stairs. I changed the metal bars to glass panels, which allow for better view from the balcony and for aesthetic choice. This will better fit the style of the house - modern, vacation home, view prioritized.