Wednesday, March 30, 2022

Architecture Wednesday: Outpost

This is Outpost, and artist’s live/work studio and sculpture garden set on twenty acres in the remote, harsh high desert of Bellevue, Idaho. This ain’t your mama’s vacation spot.

Rising from the high desert floor against a dramatic backdrop of the Sawtooth Mountains, this 3,882 square foot house was designed to age gracefully, to restrict impact on the land and to sort of force the owner to spend time outside. Now, the high desert is a windy spot, so there is an enclosed “paradise garden” where the owner has planted roses, grapes, and espaliered fruit trees that is separated from the landscape by thick masonry walls, but you are still outdoors.

A readily available construction material—concrete block—is used for the primary structure, making it quick and inexpensive to build. Interior finishes include unfinished recycled fir floors, walls, and cabinets; plaster made from natural clays and pigments; and Carrara marble kitchen counters. All of the other materials used in the structure, including the concrete block, car decking [structural tongue-and-groove material], and plywood, require little or no maintenance and are capable of withstanding the extreme weather that characterize the desert’s four seasons.

The separate studio/office, laundry, powder room, garage, and mechanical room are all on the lower entry level, and upstairs is designed around one open, multifunctional room overlooked by a mezzanine bedroom; with living spaces on the second floor, the home remains above the winter snowpack, and provides 360-degree views of the surrounding high desert and mountains.

It’s harsh, like the landscape, but fully functional, and environmentally friendly, and seems like an outpost on a distant planet.

That’s what I call a getaway.

14 comments:

  1. This is very gorgeous.

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  2. Well....i would like that in a post-nuclear war. I'd feel as though I was living in the Thunderdome world. Love the simple clean lines.

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  3. Is there road access or do you fly in on the back of a giant vulture like "The Donald" in some drug-induced mind trip? Where's the nearest McDonalds?

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  4. @Mitchell
    I like the other-worldliness of it, and the urban loft interiors, but is quite far out!

    @SickoRicko
    The views are stunning, season to season.

    @Maddie
    Exactly!

    @Yorshire
    Well, there is a garage so I think there's a road. And since I don't eat fast food, I won't be missing Mickey D's!

    @Ur-spo
    It has something, doesn't it?

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  5. Beautiful, classy, stunning, well designed, a dream!
    I'd LOVE to live here. No traffic, no neighbors, no fucking internet. I'd miss blogging but that's about it.
    It's beautifully designed. Love the lines.

    XOXO

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  6. And I smiled, I like it but probably only in Summer.

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  7. @Six
    I love the "no traffic" aspect of it!!

    @Travel
    I dunno, the winters could be a time of great solitude.

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  8. Like it!!

    Two words---Heating/Cooling

    Also, I see they started the entryway coming up and laid the foundation. Let's slap some texture on the thing.

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  9. Genius. Wow. I am blown away. Thanks for sharing, Bob.

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  10. It looks like a swanky place to ride out the apocalypse!

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  11. @Victor
    You like? You don't?

    @upton
    It is quite stunning and yet not for everyone.

    @Steve
    Well, I guess they called it Outpost for a reason!

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  12. Gorgeous from an architectural view, but my first reaction was how do they reach their bookshelves? But that's just me. It would take a lot for me to live in something as hard-surfaced as this during the winter! xoxo

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