Retreat Cove

Situated in the Southern Gulf Islands, this building will serve as the primary residence and workspace for two professional artists.
Location Galiano Island, BC
Completed 2007
M&L Value 260K
Architect Owner and M&L
Engineer Cascade Engineering Group

This waterfront property used to be a log dump and has a large knob of rock at its centre. These features made it a challenging site and significant foundations works were required to work with the topography. The owners are artists and no strangers to building, so in collaboration with M&L they developed their own architecture for the home.

The buildings comprise of four areas for main residence, guests, art studio and dance studio, all of which are arranged around the central rock feature of the site. M&L helped to develop the concept for the timber frame structure,provided detailed designs,fabrication,and install services. The frame is enclosed with SIP panels on wallsand roof.

The art studio required a large open space with a hoist for lifting art works, so M&L designed a pair of Pratt trusses to span the studio and carry the hoist. The timbers are all of Douglas fir; some kiln dried timbers were used selectively to minimize shrinkage in the larger beams, and curved timbers were used for features in this home. The dance studio, Kiva, features curved masonry walls and is connected to the main residence by a breezeway with a glazed roof. Both studios also feature glazed ridge lights to maximize light to these spaces.

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