HAEGI WENDLS
Haegi Wendls is a former farmhouse in the municipality of Zwischenwasser in Vorarlberg, Austria dating back to 1458. It has seen many uses and adaptations, accommodating a variety of residents and commercial uses, and has been rebuilt and renovated over the centuries while retaining its historic appearance.
Haegi Wendls was too big for the young family who moved in several years ago. The vision of an open house was born, a place to live combined with a cultural meeting place for the neighbourhood. Instead of demolishing the old timber and stone building, the plan was to restore and renovate it. As in the past, only sustainable building materials were to be used and existing structures were to be retained as far as possible.
The history of the building was to be preserved, brought up to modern standards, but kept simple. The conventional building industry is not yet prepared for such an ambitious project of circular architecture, so the collaboration of various pioneers of the region was born. The common vision was to show that circularity is possible and that a house can be renovated with regenerative materials. Carpenters, clay builders, roofers, energy consultants, civil engineers and architects, together with the construction managers the academic staff and students of BASEhabitat, University of Arts Linz, have started to share their expertise and passion to develop and test new solutions and implement them together with the students on the construction site. The collaboration started in July 2020. Students have been on site in various phases between October 2020 and February 2022. They could gain a lot of hands-on experience on a real construction site, applying and widening their know-how in the use of sustainable materials as earth and fibres. This is a core topic of the study programmes and part of the curriculum of BASEhabitat at the University of Arts in Linz.
Images and Plans
Technical Description
Haegi Wendls is a co-design and construction site experiment. The design had to be completely in line with the old building and had to be adapted during the construction process with the involvement of craftsmen and other experts, to find proper solutions.
In the new design, the external appearance remained unchanged, only the roof was slightly raised. Most of the façades were left in their weathered wooden planks. The typical Vorarlberg wooden shingle façade was renewed. Stone and wood were the dominant materials in the historic building, sparsely insulated with fibers. As construction began, it turned out that the house needed to be partially gutted and structurally re-secured. The foundation was reinforced and some of the old wooden pillars had to be replaced. Wood that had to be removed was reused later.
We converted the barn and parts of the former agricultural area into a cultural venue. The old corridor has been turned into a foyer with a trass lime floor and a bar made from discarded roof tiles. A wide steel staircase with wooden steps leads to the event room. The raw stone walls were only fixed with lime mortar. Clay mixed with cow dung and fibers was used to plaster the sanitary facilities.
The living area has been opened up, the rooms have been enlarged and the living area now partly extends over two floors. The new wall construction is based on the existing wooden outer skin, which has been reinforced internally with a timber frame. A mixture of wood chips and clay slurry was used for the insulation. The walls were clad with slats and plastered with clay. Some of the walls were paneled with reclaimed wood. The floors on the ground level were made of rammed earth, on top of a fill of foam glass gravel. The wooden floors on the upper floor were combined with earth tiles on top of a fill of perlite and earth.
The clean lines of the architectural design create a special aesthetic through the combination of old and new elements and the natural materials used.