Article source: Carl Fredrik Svenstedt Architect

Building in stone implies carving a mountain, the result imposing and profound, creating a presence with self-evident materiality. On this site, near the Cistercian Abbaye du Thoronet, building with stone extracted from Roman quarries places the project in a temporality resonant with the landscape.

The stone blocks, mathematical, are one by one metres by fifty centimetres thick, and weigh exactly one metric ton. They rise in equilibrium ten metres high, twist and turn. The walls dilate, filigrees of pure weight in the sun.

Image Courtesy © Dan Glasser

• Architects: Carl Fredrik Svenstedt Architect (Tae in Kim, Camille Jacoulet, Thomas Carpentier, Clément Niau)
• Project: Les Domaines Ott Château de Selle
• Location: Château de Selle, Côtes de Provence, 83460 Taradeau, France
• Photography: Hervé Abbadie, Dan Glasser
• Clients: Les Domaines Ott
• Lead Architects: Carl Fredrik Svenstedt Architect
• Structure: Beccamel Mallard, Ingénérie 84
• Landscape: Christophe Ponceau, Mélanie Drevet
• Gross Built Area (square meters or square foot): 4 370 m2
• Completion Year: 2017

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