Applied recycling with Scavenger Studio by Olson Kundig

Scavenger Studio is a small, 64-square-metre house in woodlands not far from Seattle, in the Puget Sound region, and it was built from material that the architect Les Eerkes for Olson Kundig scavenged from nearby homes slated for demolition.


The Collins dictionary gives the meaning of the verb “scavenge” as “通过在废物或不需要的物体之间搜索来收集事物”, and in the case of the architectLes Eerkesfrom the studio of the same name founded in 2015, material that can be used to build a house in the woods. In the case in point, Eerkes, at the time a Design principal at the renowned奥尔森·昆迪格（Olson Kundig）sourced plywood cladding, kitchen cabinets and a tiny porthole window from houses about to be bulldozed. Asustainable choice for both the environment and the budgetof the client, artist and activist, insomuch as readymade elements that would otherwise be destroyed were upcycled to craft the two-storey house and studio.
Eerkes also decided to raise the small cabin on concrete stumps, without digging foundations, another way to cut costs and keep down the environmental impact. A simple wood panel structure sits on the concrete stumps to form the house, holding up a long, slightly sloping overhanging roof to provide passive protection from the summer sun.
The kitchen and living area occupy the ground floor of thedouble-height interior。The sleeping loft and studio of the artist is accessed by a steel staircase and contains lots of shelving. A panel next to the bed drops down, as you can see in the photo by Benjamin Benschneider, opening the room to its surroundings.
The facade is clad in T1-11 plywood scavenged by the architect and charred by the owner using a Japanese technique calledshou sugi ban。这保留了木头，并创造出较深的色调，有助于将房屋融入周围的森林中。
下拉面板的外部被涂成红色。地板是砖石，天花板是胶合板，墙壁是干墙。聚碳酸酯面板用于诊断窗口。
Scavenger Studio by Les Eerkes showcases thebeauty of repurposingin such a delightful natural environment where the cabin completely blends in.

Christiane Bürklein

Project team
Design by Les Eerkes
Architect of Record:奥尔森·昆迪格（Olson Kundig）
Yousman Okano（工作人员建筑师）
Schuchart/Dow (contractor)
Year: 2014
Location: Puget Sound, Washington, USA
Photography: Benjamin Benschneide