Trnava

224.8 m² on two floors in a slope: living upstairs, work below, energy €70 a month.

Live upstairs, work below.

Energy €70 a month, off-grid possible.

224.8 m²3 rooms + living room2 garagesterrace 42 m²A0

Trnava · built 2022–2023

From 675 000 €

Covered wooden terrace of an earth-sheltered house in Trnava, dining table under glazed pergola, hills in the distance.

Terrace 4 m above the road.

The living area is upstairs, and the 42 m² terrace sits 4 m above the road, so it cannot be seen from the street. The work area is one floor below and kept apart. Living and working each stay on a single level. The neighbour kept his view; the owner has privacy.

Sloping plot
The house is set into the slope. A plot that is a problem for an ordinary building is an advantage here.
Ready for off-grid operation
The house is connected to the grid, but its wiring, its storage and its water source are prepared so that it keeps working during an outage.
Terrace
A covered or open area adjoining the living space.
42 m²
Earth cover
The house is covered by a layer of soil that insulates it, damps temperature swings and protects the shell from sun and frost.

How the house was built

Photographs from the Trnava site, 2022–2023: excavation, drainage, shell, windows.

Deep excavation pit with tool-marked earthen walls, an orange pipe standing at the base, for an earth-sheltered house in Trnava. — Excavation

The lower floor sits in the slope, so the build starts with a deep dig.

The height difference gives two floors, yet from next door the house looks low.

Excavated foundation site of the Trnava earth-sheltered house, geotextile and gravel piles, digger and worker with pipe. — Drainage

Drainage under the foundation.

A geotextile goes on the floor of the dig, then a layer of gravel and a drainage pipe. Water from the slope runs off beneath the house instead of standing against the structure. Whether the house stays dry is decided here, at the start of the build, not after you move in.

Concrete below ground.

Construction site of the Trnava earth-sheltered house, concrete wall with formwork and orange rebar grid, two workers and a child nearby.

Concrete shell of an earth-sheltered house in Trnava under construction, banked earth, beams and pink insulation on the end wall.

Bare concrete shell of an earth-sheltered house in Trnava, banked earth around it, pink insulation on walls under construction.

The lower floor, which sits in the ground, is concrete cast in formwork, and the soil then goes back against it. Above it is the upper floor with a timber ceiling structure.

Garage
Set into the ground or covered with earth, the same as the house.
2 spaces
Drainage layer
Below ground there is a layer that carries water away from the shell and does not let it stand against the structure.
Green roof
The roof surface is alive. It holds back rainwater, cools itself by evaporation and gives the plot back the area the house took.
Preserved view
The house is placed so that the view from the plot stays untouched.

Timber interior surfacesWood on the walls, ceilings or floors, as a counterweight to the concrete.

Truck with crane delivers glass panels beside the bare concrete shell of an earth-sheltered house in Trnava, sand piled nearby. — Glazing delivery

Concrete shell of an earth-sheltered house in Trnava mid-construction, glazed front, orange-edged window openings, soil piles around. — During construction

Glazing across two floors.

The open side of the house is glazed along its length and over the height of both floors, so the lower floor in the slope gets daylight too. Insulation frames the openings so heat is not lost at the window frames.

Straight out to the terrace.

Living is on the upper floor, and a wide glazed opening leads straight out onto the 42 m² terrace. The house has three rooms, a living room, a bathroom, a technical room and a storeroom.

Unfinished interior of an earth-sheltered house in Trnava, concrete and brick walls, wood-beam ceiling, wide window opening to terrace.

Workers fit a large window frame into a concrete opening inside the unfinished earth-sheltered house in Trnava, wooden beams overhead.

Earth-sheltered house in Trnava with grassy roof edge over pale walls, wood-clad upper level, car and person by garages.

Two garages below the home.

From the driveway you enter two garages and reach the front door. The living floor with the terrace is above them. The lower floor is pushed into the slope, and there is a garden on the roof.