Lake House

By Editorial Staff - 15 December 2023
Diasen has participated in the project

Surrounded by the lush nature that is so typical of the Scottish landscape, Lake House is an 18^th-century country house in the Georgian style, which is based on the primacy of mathematical proportions, the regularity of lines and the predominant use of symmetries. When the Edinburgh-based Simpson & Brown architecture studio was commissioned to restore and upgrade the premises, it chose an approach rooted in maintaining the constraints and peculiarities, while recovering the original decorative and joinery elements wherever possible. An approach that proved literally to be a winning solution, earning the architects the Rescue of a Georgian Building Award in 2022 from The Georgian Group, an association that promotes Georgian heritage. The revamp was designed to preserve the traditional charm of this country house, focusing on the interior and carefully restoring the surfaces, some of which are curved, that time and damp had damaged quite significantly in some cases. Using Diasen’s natural-origin building materials, Lake House has been restored to its former glory, maximizing both its esthetic potential and its energy efficiency, with significant improvements in air quality and comfort.

Lake House courtesy Diasen

Diathonite Thermactive.037 is a lime- and cork-based plaster that has antibacterial properties and also ensures the walls can breathe, thus helping to balance room humidity. Once the plaster was 7-cm thick, the surface was given an Argatherm lime-based thermal finishing coat, designed to limit heat loss and make the walls pleasant to the touch, with just a smidgen of roughness, and finally painted with natural colors. The results clearly show that the approach to this project and the choice of Diasen materials were central to improving humidity levels and creating a warmer, more comfortable interior. Such a perception is supported by the results obtained and validated by the special WUFI software developed by the Fraunhofer Institute for Building Physics in Stuttgart to analyze the behavior of moisture in a wall subjected to internal and external thermal stresses.