“Maison sur le Lac” is a project designed by ACDF Architecture. Located on the shores of Lake Memphremagog in the Eastern Townships, the House Lachance is a secondary residence designed for two clients who are native to the region, and currently oscillate between Montreal and Magog. Rapidly, the two clients who love music, nature and the land expressed their desire for a home with an open living area, where gastronomy and good dishes are prepared in direct relation to nature and the lake. At the heart of the space thus settle the three strong and unifying elements of the project: the kitchen, the dining table and the piano. Photography by Adrien Williams

Like Memphremagog`s landscape, the house is built with openness as a mindset, without physical boundaries. The starting point for the architecture is that of the immediate landscape; the scenic beauty of the surroundings. Large agricultural lands and valleys, whose only visual limits are fences and stone walls, extending to the horizon and opening again to other mountainous landscapes.

Located in the center of the site, the fence is redefined as a continuous wood band. From the ground, the wood band rises and envelops the living spaces by modulating the openings of the house. The horizontal openings define panoramic views of nature and the lake. Experiences with the landscape are many and varied. And despite the changing views, simplicity and volumetric organization of the house are based on this simple anchorage to the site.

The house naturally takes up this idea of the local landscape so often panoramic, except that the limits of a fence are used here to define the space, creating a place for the program by trapping the substance of landscape in its center. Vernacular typology of the Eastern Townships, the wooden farm buildings and sustainable construction made of field stone, is reinterpreted to define the modern house that is generously opened on the landscape.

Data Sheet
Location: Memphrémagog lac, QC
Opening date: 2016
Area: 2 800 p2/ft2
Architect: ACDF Architecture
Architectural team: Maxime-Alexis Frappier, Martin Champagne, Christelle Montreuil Jeanpois, Clothilde Caillé-Lévesque, Maxime Boisselle, Maxime Boily
Other professionals: Jean Marc Dugré structural engineer; Constructions Boivin, General contractor