Good morning. In the last few lectures I’ve been talking about the history of domestic building construction. But today I want to begin looking at some contemporary, experimental designs for housing. So, I’m going to start with the house which is constructed more or less under the ground. And one of the interesting things about this project is that the owners – both professionals but not architects – wanted to be closely involved, so they decided to manage the project themselves. Their chief aim was to create somewhere that was as environmentally-friendly as possible. But at the same time they wanted to lie somewhere peaceful – they’d both grown up in a rural area and disliked urban life.
So, the first thing they did was to look for a site. And they found a disused stone quarry in a beautiful area. The price was relatiely low, and they liked the idea of recycling the land, as it were. As it was, the quarry was an ugly blot on the landscape, and it wasn’t productive any longer, either.