Designer Omer Arbel’s Vancouver studio has made a film documenting the concrete forms of House 75.0, which is being built on a hay farm near Surrey in British Columbia, Canada. The video shows the partially complete home that is being used as a testbed to continue Arbel’s experiments into the properties of concrete on the scale of a building.
According to Deezen, the team designed the unique home around a series of 10 tree-like concrete forms that reach as high as 10 meters, rising up to become the home’s ceilings. When the home is complete, a magnolia tree will be planted in each of the concrete forms, with leaves and branches spreading over the roof.
“We decided to consider the concrete trees, with real magnolia trees planted within, as if they were archaeological remains found on site,” Arbel told Dezeen.
The house’s tree-like structures were created using an experimental method or pouring concrete that combined fabric formwork and plywood ribs. In the case of 75.9, the team developed a system of plywood ribs that hold together the tough geotextile fabric. When filled with concrete, the fabric responds to hydrostatic pressure and swells to make a sort of “reverse trumpet,” with a follow cone at the top, into which they plan to transplant mature trees.
The larger trees will shelter the home’s biggest rooms including its dining and seating area and the gym, while the smaller trees will be in smaller rooms like the tv room, bathroom, and a bedroom. The rooms will be enclosed by traditionally constructed walls with curved forms projecting from them into the surrounding landscape.
