Antti Lovag’s Maison Bernard

The Maison Bernard was the very first project by architect Antti Lovag. It is an unifamiliar house based on the organic architecture principles, ordrered by 1970s businessman and friend Pierre Bernard.

Pierre Bernard and Antti Lovag

When the project was executed, Lovag had already worked in the sixties with Jacques Cüelle, one of the first architects to develop that kind of building in France. As Pierre Bernard gave him full freedom, the result was this wonder…

View of the living room façade and swiming pool – nowdays

As Lovag disliked the angulous and straight lined structure of the conventional buildings, both inside and outside are based on the natural curves of the organic growings and the structure adapted itself to the piece of land as the house was simply growing as a vegetal without any plans… Common and private spaces distributed themselves on the surface of the plot and were then linked by tubular hallways.

To create this kind of buildings, Lovag built steel frames as a skeleton, and decided later where doors and windows were to be opened, keeping in mind the views on the landscape and the light of every season of the year. Then with a pressure hose, concrete was throwed upon the structure. Late step was waterproofing via fiberglass on the outshell. Nearly twenty years later, by 1981, the house was finished – Antti Lovag lived on the worksite during all the process.

Para realizar esta arquitectura innovadora, se construyeron armazones de forjado, disponiendo a posteriori las ventanas para disfrutar del paisaje y de la luz de cada época del año. Después, con la ayuda de una manguera se vertió el cemento por toda la estructura, impermeabilizándola por fuera con fibra de vidrio. La obra finalizó en 1971, después de casi 20 años y Lovag vivió ahí durante todo el proceso.

Scale model and light studies

The skeletal structure of the house.

The original living room

Living room with view on the swiming pool

The cocktail cabinet

Some years ago, Isabelle and Jean-Patrice Bernard, the heirs of the buiding, decided to revamp the house, asking to architect Odile Deck a project that lasted nearly six years. Rooms were painted in bright colours and new decorative and architectural elements were added. But the main transformation is that the house is now an artist residence rather than a familly house.

Living room after revamping

The Orange Room

Entry of the Pink Room

Nowdays Maison Bernard Endowment Fund handles and manages the building which is open to the public on appointment. The house also receives artist to develop project based upon the nature around the house.

We still do not know if we would live in such a hobbit house but we are convinced that the Maison Bernard is on of the wonders of the XXth century architecture…

Till the next post.