CASETTA TESSINO
In early 2024, a Swiss artist and climate activist approached me with a request for a secluded retreat in the woods of his property. Paying homage to Henry David Thoreau, the idea was born to spend time in the woods, concentrating on writing and conceptualising the client‘s activism. Thoreau is regarded as a pioneer in formulating the idea of civil disobedience, while his book Walden had a great influence on the garden city movement. This thematic overlap created a common point of reference. As in Walden, the refuge in Loco contains only a place to sleep, a place to sit and a place to write. While Loco‘s zoning laws forbid any additions to the existing building stock, the concept of a tree house seemed an appropriate way to circumvent the regulations. Clearly not an ordinary tree house built by or for children, the tree house in Loco becomes an inbetween. Not quite illegal, but not quite conformist either. Something Henry David Thoreau would have approved of. Three trees form the anchor points of a triangular base. A rotated equilateral triangle is placed on top, with its corners poking out between the trees. While one side faces the slope, the other two face up and down the Onsernone Valley, capturing the landscape. The bed is placed in the floor and can be prepared by removing four wooden panels. Otherwise the small room seems empty, except for two planks. One forms a bench and the other a desk. This makes the most of the limited space. All three facades of the building can be opened. This allows the interior to benefit from the forest climate in summer, while the canopy of trees provides shade. The building‘s skin is made of translucent polycarbonate, allowing the sun to heat the tree house in the colder months. Once completed, the occupation and appropriation of the small space and its immediate surroundings will become an experiment, testing the design and our habits at the same time, as the client decided to open the tree house to other creatives who would like to use it as a writing cabin.
