The Rabbit Hole

There is only one way in and one way out, via a corridor that brings you in from the open landscape.  As you follow it in, it gets darker and darker, then gradually higher and higher until you again step out into the open landscape of the courtyard.

Belgian firm Lens°ass Architecture took a small group of half-collapsed farm buildings and created a unified structure that is a single-family dwelling with an attached veterinary practice.  Bricks were used extensively throughout – as floors, walls, and ceilings – and the site’s existing bricks were cleaned and reused as part of the new structure.  The large openings of the former hayloft are now windows, and the old cow stalls are the new veterinary area.

Instead of developing the design independently in a studio, architect Bart Lens took walks around the site with the client and talked about the space and its goals and possibilities.  The Rabbit Hole integrates itself into the cultural landscape, almost as if it has always been there.