House 75.9 / Omer Arbel

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Description submitted by the project team. 75.9 is a family home in a hay field in the Canadian Pacific Northwest. Built around monumental ‘lily leaf’ columns – the result of a concrete pouring method invented by the studio – the house marks the first time Arbel has applied its process-based design approach to an architectural scale.

Before Omer Arbel was formally commissioned to build the house, on a vast expanse of land in the countryside south of Vancouver, Arbel began devising a method of pouring concrete into a fabric stretched between radially arranged ribs of lightweight plywood. Only after the first column was poured on site – in a successful first experiment – ​​did the clients agree to let Omer Arbel design the rest of the house around it.

The columns formed from fabric are treated as if they were archaeological ruins found in the landscape, considering the house as a contemporary construction built around and between them. The living spaces are separated into four double-height volumes, built in glass and cedar wood. Magnolia trees grow on the roof, planted in the hollow tops of the columns. The surrounding hay field has been raised like a carpet to cover the connecting passages of the house, allowing the architecture to merge with the landscape as if it were a natural extension of it.

Inside 75.9 (all Arbel projects are numbered chronologically) different heights and positions for each column create a cinematic narrative of domestic habitation. The double-height living room, dining space and open-plan kitchen are all under the cover of a column.

Its rough finish contrasts with the polished floors – also made of concrete – and is complemented by warm wooden accessories and furniture, as well as a lush Japanese-inspired interior garden. At all times, the spaces are illuminated by lamps from Bocci, the Vancouver and Berlin-based lighting company co-founded by Arbel.

75.9 is the result of more than a decade of materials experimentation, and the most ambitious experiment in Arbel’s process-based approach to date. By revisiting an ancient building material, the house is both a highly contemporary domestic landscape and a timeless monument with archaeological scope.