PACHANO&VOLLERT

We are a full service architecture and interior design office working in the Berkshires, Western Massachusetts, the Hudson Valley, New York, City and beyond. We aim to elevate the quality of people’s lives through architecture by creating spaces that inspire discovery. Our approach is simultaneously exploratory, technical, and responsive to requirements of the project and sites on which we build. Our process intuitively reveals possibilities latent within every brief over a range of project types and scales including urbanism, buildings, houses, renovations, additions, interior design, landscape and furniture. Regardless of scale, we are committed to be curiously engaged and thorough from beginning to end.

About
Services
Process
Email
Instagram

PORT APPLE
Tyringham, Massachusetts

Our brief for this house included evaluating an existing structure, master planning the circulation and relocation of an existing building on the sprawling site and integrating an existing swimming pool within the whole scheme. We thought the best course was to demolish the existing structure so that we could accomplish the client’s desires in the best way possible: easy one level living, integration with the view of the Cobble, connection to the pool and high efficiency from the building systems. The result is an 1800sf super-insulated and air-tight home which includes two-bedrooms, two-baths, office, living, dining and cooking-all the essentials of contemporary living wrapped into a tight building envelope.

Most important for our clients was maintaining a view of the Cobble from the existing pool which sits almost nine feet above the finished floor of the house. For this reason we chose a flat roof which has provided more of a view from the pool than the previous house. So, Tyringham now has a flat roof!

Although it is difficult to see in images, the front facade is at a slight angle to north/south walls, so the building is not a perfect box. It faces west/southwest, so by angling the facade slightly south we are able to capture just a little more of the heat from the winter sun. Exterior shades protect the south and west facades in the summer from the baking sun.

We love when our clients appreciate the finite resources of our world, the way that human habitation has decimated the natural world for other living creatures and have an appreciation for the aging process of materials. To this, our clients have repurposed stones uncovered as part of excavation and are returning the front yard to a native pollinator space. Also, the siding they chose will age over time, changing color as the sun moves around it while maintaining its material integrity. This is one of our favorite projects because of the way we were able to weave so much program in a tight space and the decisions our clients made with the landscape.