Overlook the Adriatic Sea from this Oasis of Modern Design Bedrock House, created by architecture studio Turato Architects, sits on the rocky Island of Krk, Croatia. The house’s sleek, white-walled modern touch juxtaposes the terrain around it in a way that maximises the beauty of each in tandem. Turato Architects’ two lead designers Idis Turato and Marko Liović worked hard to deliver an extraordinary structure for the project, based around the idea of two continuous walls intersecting with two main interiors. While the building’s environment falls far outside the comfort of modern living, it also makes for outstanding views. A craggy Adriatic coastline, an oak forest and a smattering of cacti, agaves and lavender enrich the design’s immediate vicinity – all the while feeding into the sphere of considerations the architects took to the project. We sat down with Idis Turato to discuss the story of Bedrock House. Project name: Bedrock House Architecture Studio: Turato Architecture Lead Architects: Idis Turato and Marko Liović Project Location: Brzac, island of Krk, Croatia Completion Year: 2018 Gross Build Area: 200m2 Photographers: Bosnić + Dorotić THE PLUS: What did you turn to for inspiration when creating this project? Idis Turato: There are several topics that occupy my interests in general, and could be listed as an inspiration or tools which triggered the ideas and concepts for this specific house: sketches by Oton Gliha, one of the most famous Croatian painters of 20th century; projects from American sculptor Richard Serra, and motives and atmosphere that one can instantly connect with works form David Hockney as well as work of American architect Pierre Koenig. TP: What’s the story behind this project? Did the client come to you? IT: The clients had a fantastic plot in the middle of the island of Krk, and wanted to create new home, miles away, both physically and geographically, from Zagreb. They also wanted a completely different type of house than the one they used to live in on the hills above Zagreb. There was a great amount of dialogue, but also a wide trust between clients and the concept we wanted to implement. TP: What was the most challenging part of the project? IT: The location of the house is very secluded from any neighbours or bordering plots and other houses, main roads and infrastructure, therefore there were numerous practical challenges in the process of building, as well as the permanent question will the house manage to fulfil the needs of a new home, having in mind the cut-off context of the location. TP: Looking back, is there anything you wish you did differently? IT: No. TP: How did you work in sustainability into the design? IT: As it is so far away from other populated locations therefore it had to have independent system of functioning in terms of electricity – and it is all driven by solar panels and sustainable system embedded in the project. TP: What influenced your colour choices when working on this project? IT: It is important to point out that the house refuses to be defined by a color; at the same time it is white, transparent and translucent. It is cladded in travertine, laid on grass and Mediterranean herbs, cut into a limestone rock, precisely placed into a pre-existing fold at the vast site. Having said that, it is impossible to define it by color. The execution of the house is straightforward and the technology widely recognisable, in concrete, steel and glass. This is why the programs and activities or the house are, in a way, supported by very common, I would even say generic, white furniture in contemporary architecture: Mies Van der Rohe loungers, Charles and Ray Eames chairs, Chesterfield sofas and recliners – the expected components in the context of sought-after modernity, which serve as a neutral framework for the acting out of endless possibility, of unforeseen gestures and events. TP: Personally, what is your favourite element of the now finished product? IT: After finishing a project I rarely look back at it; I even try to practice this as a rule – not to look back and analyse. The main concept that we were focused on was to create a house that is generated on the dichotomy between walls and agendas, thus creating space along the course of two walls, underneath two shifted roofs, embodying an architecture somewhere between transparent and opaque, interior and exterior, closed and open, private and public, recreational and residential, and once we have succeeded, too much thinking about it was finished, and my mind and team already on another projects and ideas. Floor Plan:
