NORD Architecture

The Highland region of Scotland is staging a major Housing Fair in August 2009 to showcase the best of house building design and technology. It aims to change the current trend of urban developments in the Highland region. An RIAS design competition was held in the Spring of 2007 to coincide with Highland 2007 - a celebration of Highland culture - as a main feature of the Six Cities Design Festival . Based on Finish housing expos the competition was open to architects, builders, suppliers and designers.

NORD Architecture’s winning scheme is one of 27 residential developments for the housing expo at Balvonie Braes, near to Inverness. The project will mark the entrance to the Highland Housing Fair.

The design draws on vernacular forms, materials and a specific landscape setting with it’s daily and seasonal changes in colour, texture, light and spectacle.

The choice of stone refers to the stone buildings typically found within highland settlements. The building mass is designed as an object - like volume in stone, crafted to allude to the ribbon of rough-stone-roofs strung along the landscape of the highlands.

www.highlandhousingfair.com