Multi-purpose hall
In the former service quarters of the château of the Domaine d'Ors, in the heart of a vast natural reserve, the architect Leo Berellini has completed the construction of a new multi-purpose hall for the town of Châteaufort.
The new multi-purpose hall is associated with an important heritage site including a mill, a chapel, an orangery, and other edifices positioned around the park. Situated just outside the town, the site extends over an area of 5 hectares, in the middle of nature, next to the protected natural reserve of the Merantaise Valley.
The service quarters of the château are comprised of three buildings arranged in a “U” shape around a 600m² grand courtyard, oriented south. A protected wooded area surrounds the site. The new extension stands to the north, in a clearing behind the building.
The project aim is discretion. It blends perfectly into the green surroundings. It exists in harmony alongside the service quarters of the château, which have their own charms. The new hall nestles into the slope of the terrain, discreetly covered by a green roof in continuity with the clearing. It is positioned on the axis of the building, respecting its symmetry.
The longitudinal walls are designed and built with rammed earth, as if the side of the hill had been cut away, exposing its entrails, and thereby the stratigraphy of its geological layers as well. What material could have better integrated into the site than its own soil, worked into strata, without altering its texture or colour?
The supporting rammed earth walls are lined on the inside with a 20cm-thick layer of poured hempcrete, left exposed and affixed to the rammed earth walls with wooden studs embedded in the thickness of this lining.
During the design phase, all the architectural elements were carefully evaluated in order to push their thermal characteristics to their maximum capacities.
