The building of the family home in Včelná near České Budějovice, designed by Ivan Kroupa, had a difficult fate. Misunderstood by neighbours, mishandled by workers, and still waiting to be fully completed. But it stands. Confident and contextual. A bit reserved at first, but warm and welcoming inside. Truly reflecting its owner's soul.

The House in Zdiměřice, designed by architect Stanislav Fiala, then working as part of studio D3A, has appeared in quite a few movies in the sixteen years since its completion. This summer we sat at the same oblong kitchen table with the owner where once Jan Budař, Czech Made Man, drank expensive alcohol, the fireplace and the back garden appeared in a commercial for a home improvement store, and several well-known actors have previously relaxed in the luxurious whirlpool opened towards the main living space. But the same owner still lives in this same house.

Some say it looks like a sphinx, others compare it to wealthy factory owners' functionalist villas. As it sits on the Barbořina hill, right above the town of Kroměříž, it certainly could be many things, just not ordinary. For the then thirty-year-old architect Svatopluk Sládeček, this villa was one of his very first projects. 

The second series of our summer visits to famous homes and villas, which have been tried and tested by many years of use, was kicked off by our trip to Vonoklasy near Prague. In the case of this villa by architects Ladislav Lábus and Lenka Dvořáková, an incredible quarter of a century has passed since it was completed.

Timber is a material of the past, but also for the future. That’s certainly something we learned in the ERA21 #02/2022 issue on carbon-neutral architecture, and we get a reminder every year at the Wood Buildings Show in Prague. This year, Do Janne Vermeulen, co-founder of the Dutch architecture studio Team V, attended the show and we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to talk to her. The conversation naturally drifted to the recently completed HAUT building in Amsterdam, one of the tallest hybrid timber buildings in the world.