Origin Tree House by Atelier LAVIT

As its customers often wanted to define it, ORIGIN is an exceptional cabin, a unique and tailor-made project. A hundredyear-old oak, one of the most beautiful and tall of the domain of the Château de Raray, was the starting point for the whole reflection: how to sublimate the tree? Creating around it a tailored wooden-dress.

Architect: Atelier LAVIT
Client: Cabanes des Grands Chênes
Location: Château de Raray, 60810 Raray, France
Year: 2017
Structures: Nid Perche / créateur d’hébergements insolites
General contractors : Nid Perche / créateur d’hébergements insolites
Dimensions: 23 sqm
Photography: Marco Lavit Nicora

From the architect: The architectural challenge for Atelier LAVIT was to create a functional and comfortable hotel room, being faithful to the first inspiration of the project: a bird-nest. The design of the cabin, coupled with the construction techniques, led to a rationalization of the assembly logic of the branches collected by the birds to create their impregnable shelters. Meeting point between poetry and carpentry mastery, ORIGIN tree house discreetly stands out among the centenarian oaks of the Château de Raray forest, as if it had always been part of the scenery. Majestic and elegant, it integrates and completes an already impressive landscape, sublimating it by offering a shelter.

The access is a sequence: passing first from a platform suspended on another tall oak thirty meters away, which includes a heated spa and a chilling area. Then a wooden walkway, ten meters from the ground, leads you straight into the heart of the nest.

A wooden ladder invites you to continue the ascent in close contact with the tree, to find with wonder a large 360 ° panoramic roof-terrace. A belvedere on the oak forest of the domain, as surprising as unexpected because it’s hidden by the exterior wooden cladding.

The octagonal plan organizes the space around the oak trunk, incorporating it into the inhabited volume as the protagonist of the space that is the entrance to the tree house. Once in the patio a feeling of protection reigns as in a nest, with an easy access to the living area thanks to two large sliding glass doors.

A cosy, bright and intimate atmosphere fills the space thanks to the large windows. The inner lining of the wall is made out of poplar, a light and clear wood essence with a subtle scent. The smooth, flat interior walls are matched by the custom-made furniture surfaces, worked with fine horizontal slats, in a simple game of geometric volumes.

Around the patio the living spaces develop in succession; from the entrance to the living area and the sleeping area, till a narrow corridor with three sliding doors that give access respectively to a dressing room, a well equipped bathroom and a technical closet. Each one of the living spaces faces the large windows overlooking the forest, offering a mid-air view on the foliage of the centennian oaks of the domain.

> Tree House by Nick Waldman
> Tala Treesort by Architecture BRIO