Coastal Irish home by Pasparakis Friel embraces "exposed island context"

Walls of roughcast render and a concrete roof enclose this coastal home on Cruit Island in Ireland, designed by Donegal studio Pasparakis Friel to blend in with the surrounding rocky outcrops.

Located off the Republic of Ireland's northwestern coast, the home is designed for a family who has lived near the site for four generations and desired a space to accommodate large gatherings.

Pasparakis Friel created a pared-back pitched form coated in rough render, which draws on the rocky coastal landscape, with contrasting green window frames that nod to the surrounding vegetation.

"Cruit is a precious landscape," studio co-founder Ronan Friel told Dezeen. "We felt a need for the building to become part of it; a desire for the building to complement the landscape and its geology," he continued.

"On the one hand, it's a pragmatic response to the brief which demanded limited maintenance – there's a certain futility to painting walls in this wind-blown, rain-battered, sun-bleached, island context," Friel added.

"On the other hand, we enjoy the rawness of the exposed island context and as such the house celebrates this in its raw, natural finishes."

Oriented to the landscape, the living, dining and kitchen area takes advantage of coastal views to the east through full-height windows, while the more enclosed western side of the home contains its bedrooms.

Beneath the apex of the home's pitched roof, the social living spaces benefit from higher ceiling and are finished almost entirely in white to enhance the feeling of light and space.

Skylights pull natural light into the darker portion of the home, along with smaller, square windows that frame views of the landscape.

To the west, the living spaces are wrapped by an external patio with built-in concrete bench seating.

"We spent a great deal of time on the island at different times of the day and during different seasons to enable a strong understanding of how the building might most comfortably sit in its context and most successfully engage with views and light," Friel said.

"A solid, heavy masonry mass to the west contains cellular accommodation and shoulders the sometimes ferocious winds rolling off the Atlantic Ocean," he added.

Other homes recently completed in Ireland include Gate Lodge by A2 Architects, a dwelling in Navan informed by historic lodge houses and topped with a large red roof.

Scullion Architects revamped a terraced house in Dublin with a double-height space, and in Terenure, the studio added a "long gallery" to a 1930s home.

The photography is by Peter Molloy.

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