• Project Value: € N/A
• Client: DEEGAN
• Year: 2009
• Description:
  Located in  what is visually a highly sensitive location overlooking the lake , this project incorporated significant structural input.
  The elevated site and open structural arrangement brought challenges  both in terms of foundation construction and steelwork design. The grass roof requirement which allows the building to virtually hide on the hill makes this a highly notable building of quality design.

Architects Brief

We were asked to get involved on this project, as the site had an existing planning permission, which was not appropriate to the location. The proposed dwelling was located on an elevated and exposed site overlooking Lough Derg. We were engaged  to redesign the proposed house to meet the needs of The lookout Castle town the new owner, while also satisfying the stringent requirements of the local authority, and delivering a contemporary piece of architecture.

This dwelling was a redesigned to reduce its visual impact in the landscape. The main concept for the dwelling is the use of a sedum grass roof, and local stone/slate with grasses and climbers integrated into the cladding on the lakeside of the house.

Visually, the most dominant feature is the mono-pitch sedum roof which mimics the landscape of the hill to the rear when viewed from the lake.

This vaulted roof has been was designed to frame views of the millennium cross and the graves of the leinster-men. The house is constructed as a low energy dwelling to a high specification with an extremely airtight envelope.

Layout of the house was designed to maximise passive solar gain, and uses a heat recovery system combined with a solar array to reduce the heating load of the dwelling.

It is a hybrid steel/timber frame in filled with both cavity wall and timber-frame.

External finishes are slate stone cladding, pre-weathered zinc, bauder sedum roof, cedar cladding, and a white acrylic render system.

The house was completed in 2011