The Rauch House in Schlins was designed in a planning consortium between the client Martin Rauch and Boltshauser Architekten AG.
The materiality and shape of the house are direct reactions to the steep south-facing slope of the narrow plot in the landscape context: as if a monolithic block, resembling abstract, artificial nature, had been pushed out of the earth. Two notches articulate the rammed earth structure, wedge it backwards with the steep slope and establish a prelude and welcome gesture towards the valley at the front. Inside, the house is developed in the form of sequences of individually customizable rooms that react to the different conditions on each floor.
In contrast to more organic, archaic clay architecture, the building's design pursues a certain clarity and sharpness. The layers of brick strips inserted between the typical clay layers visually stabilise the building by emphasising the horizontality and enhancing the light and shadow effect of the surface texture. On the material-atmospheric level, the sequence of rooms creates a course that literally rises from the raw archaic to the noble and magnificent through a balanced superimposition of different stages of processing. Overall, the residential building is a laboratory-like experiment, which is a reflection of the close planning cooperation between the architect and the clay builder and builder Martin Rauch and culminates in the latter's own construction of the building.
Source: Boltshauser Architekten AG
Photos: Beat Bühler, Boltshauser Architekten AG
