House on the Minho

A weekend house for a family of four on the south bank of the Minho estuary. The brief asked for one room big enough for everyone and small rooms for sleeping.

The plan is a single timber volume, twenty-four metres long, laid parallel to the river. A concrete core in the middle holds the kitchen, the stair and the services, and divides the long room into a place to cook and a place to sit.

Walls and ceilings are lined in spruce. The windows are low and wide, framing the water rather than the sky.