Thermal Residence
Thermal Residence is version 3.0 to downsize the Thermal Philanthropic Event Center, whilst still incorporating our client’s passions: racing, music, and culinary arts; in this case into a ‘dual-winged stepped-courtyard-amphitheater form’ viewing the Racetracks as well as both sides of the ancient 125-mile-long Coachella Valley Oasis. Many aspects of the original competition-winning sketches are incorporated here into a more compact plan and section. Principally, idea of ‘rooftop amphitheater’ is brought down to hover just above the ‘racetrack wall’ becoming the arrival courtyard, the cooling water body, oasis-zen garden with shade, the living / sleeping dwelling, all with a hyper-panoramic porous guardrail-less edge condition bringing light / cross ventilation thru the ground level racetrack entry / showroom flanked by recording studio / theater and Michelin Chef’s kitchen with service access to public living / dining / performance space at apex / center-point of the stepped-courtyard-amphitheater flanked by two bedroom suites plus one main bedroom edge suite on each side. The result: consolidation of multiple schemes into a distilled ‘racetrack villa prototype’.
Thermal Residence
Thermal Residence is version 3.0 to downsize the Thermal Philanthropic Event Center, whilst still incorporating our client’s passions: racing, music, and culinary arts; in this case into a ‘dual-winged stepped-courtyard-amphitheater form’ viewing the Racetracks as well as both sides of the ancient 125-mile-long Coachella Valley Oasis. Many aspects of the original competition-winning sketches are incorporated here into a more compact plan and section. Principally, idea of ‘rooftop amphitheater’ is brought down to hover just above the ‘racetrack wall’ becoming the arrival courtyard, the cooling water body, oasis-zen garden with shade, the living / sleeping dwelling, all with a hyper-panoramic porous guardrail-less edge condition bringing light / cross ventilation thru the ground level racetrack entry / showroom flanked by recording studio / theater and Michelin Chef’s kitchen with service access to public living / dining / performance space at apex / center-point of the stepped-courtyard-amphitheater flanked by two bedroom suites plus one main bedroom edge suite on each side. The result: consolidation of multiple schemes into a distilled ‘racetrack villa prototype’.
Thermal Residence
Regarding building materiality / building systems: the elevated floor above grade is post tensioned concrete. Walls at entry level ‘base’ are cast-in-place concrete. Secondary / infill framing is largely wood stud with some cold formed steel studs. The elevated portions of the building (above the entry level) are skinned entirely in a monolithic three coat stucco with crushed seashells (recalling the Coachella or Conchilla (Spanish for seashell) Valley when this was a vast inland Sea). The building enclosure features multiple operable glass walls, transforming expansive living areas into indoor-outdoor spaces when the winter thru shoulder season clime permits. The ‘concrete-plaster shell’ construction incorporates project’s silent climate control system as one integral heating / cooling unit that leverages the artisanal aquifer below this ancient lake valley with an Aquifer Thermal Energy Storage System (ATES) which is a cost-effective technology to reduce primary energy consumption. It can also be viscerally experienced by welling-up this ‘artisanal aquifer’ at the center of the stepped-courtyard-amphitheater which together create multiple effective microclimates as well as memories of the teeming Oasis civilizations that were here in this place before us.
