Site Plan (above)
A Shed 1;
B Shed 2;
C Pavilion;
D Log cabin;
E Guest house;
F General manager’s residence;
G Stone house

Lune de Sang is a unique intergenerational venture that will see a former dairying property in northern NSW transformed into a sustainably harvested forest. The vision is exceptional. We were captivated by this vision, a vision that goes beyond one’s lifetime.

The design is a close collaboration with our client, one bound in collective understanding of the site, landscape and time. The rainforest timbers’ unhurried growth influenced our approach, with all buildings designed to respond to the notion of a 300-year lifecycle.

Looking through Shed one

The structures, both working and future habitation, are to be endowed with a sense of permanence. They have been conceived of as ruins in the landscape; ancient concrete and stone structures unearthed and retrofitted for comfortable living, with crisp glass and steel details.

We looked at ruins, forms and nature, and how some structures become cared for across generations. We sought materials that would mature over time, intensifying the buildings’ qualities rather than degrading them. We selected concrete for its multiple qualities – a precise, modern abstract material, but also ancient in its quality.

The first structures onsite are two sheds. Conceived as site ordering devices, the sheds are part of the delineation between the emerging forest and the valley below and the inhabited domestic landscape toward the ridge above. The sheds are grounded, rhythmical buildings, with a crisp repetition of elements that sit with other constructed landscape elements, to establish a territorial line and amplify the contrast in landscape condition.

Shed One Axonometric

The two sheds are the conceptual inverse of each other. Shed one, buttressed against the fall of the land, grasps space within its folded structure. Shed two, an open structure, has a soaring roof projecting out from the hillside to provide cover for a mute container beneath. The volume of each shed is anchored into the hillside, providing elemental prospect and refuge.

A calm pervades each interior, enhancing the spatial experience and the landscape beyond. The thermal mass of the concrete makes the interior significantly cooler in summer and warmer in winter.

Shed one comprises a main space with a workshop within the retained hillside. The structure frames the landscape: the staccato of the forest in front when viewed through the rhythm of the columns, the visual release upwards and outwards to the open paddock and large fig tree, and the stone wall as it winds into the building.

Shed two comprises a generous hovering roof over a storage enclosure. Concrete roof beams, 20 metres long, are knitted into the hillside, anchoring the cantilevered roof. Beneath the roof, walls unfold to facilitate materials handling and storage.

In the fullness of time, the structures will only be revealed upon arrival at their immediate setting, intensifying their presence in the landscape. For now these quiescent structures look out to the forest, waiting for its encroachment.

– John Choi