Project: Residence N.N
Architects: Alexander Erman Architecture & Design, J. Mayer H
Location: Moscow, Russia
Area: 57,048 sf
Photographs by: Ilya Ivanov
N.N Residence by J. Mayer H & Alexander Erman Architecture & Design
The project that we are going to showcase today has got to be one of the biggest residential projects that have come across our site as of yet. We’ll be showing you the N.N Residence located on a vast site just outside of Moscow, along the riverbank of the Moskva River. The design was completed by J. Mayer H with the cooperation of Alexander Erman Architecture & Design.
The images will make it very clear that this whole residence and its environment are a huge and luxurious feat, so it is best to read what the architects had to say about this project.
N.N. represents a spatial exploration between concealment and exposure. This layered topography blurs the line separating landscape and construction. It is the private residence of a family in a rural area along the River Moskva. The geometry of the floor plan fuses the building with the ground it is located on by removing individual layers and creates spaces between the strata. A cross-section shows a rich variance between the floors, and the internal links and gradual transitions toward the outside develop open layers for a flexible and programmatic organization of space.
The ambivalence of privacy and openness is modulated in various states between gentle hills and closed air spaces. By way of the building’s cantilevered and curved stories, a very wide range of transitions is formed between inside and outside, featuring constructed nature like climbing walls and pools, designed gardens and landscaped areas, as well as untouched nature.
The distance from the river is observed and protected by the natural water reservoir. The greened roofs and dense floors create a better interior climate by way of surface evaporation and heat buffer capacities for heating and cooling. The glazed façade around the entire building brings a great deal of daylight into the building and interlinks the interior with the garden. The entire topography of the plot is arranged as a half-pipe so that it rises at the edges of the plot hiding the view of the neighbors. The family’s private rooms are located deep inside the building and remain undisclosed. The bedrooms on the upper floors have direct access to the garden via the ramp-like green roofs. The undulating edges of the building create a soft transition between architecture and nature.
N.N.’s topography of privacy melts into the patterns of the rural landscape. Its edges are fuzzy, blurry, undulated fringes peeling off from the ground. It is camouflage from the air and an extravagant neighbor on the ground.
