Barczewo, PL
The subject of the project is the extension of the existing organic farm with annual milk production capacity of 120000 litres.
The extension includes an additional cowshed building for 50 cow, a milk and fruit processing plant with a fruit storage and a sawmill. Apart from erecting new buildings, the project proposes to modernize the heating system and water supply system in the residential building. The proposed heating system is based on a heat pump coupled with a central heating buffer tank. The low-heat source for this installation will be an exothermic substrate (deep bedding) in the newly designed cowshed.
The whole investment will be divided into stages. First of all, the cowshed building will be erected, consisting of two parts: a cowshed, and a complex of auxiliary rooms in the form of an addition.
The cowshed building is designed for 50 adult dairy cows. The aboveground part of the structure is made as a three-joint frame, with a span of 17.36 m and spacing of 4.00 m. It is made of solid wood, joined by truss connector plates. It forms both the roof and walls of the building. The underground structure of the building will be made with reinforced concrete. The cowshed building is designed as naturally ventilated, unheated, with a slurry tank under the slatted floor. Animal housing system: free standing, on deep litter. Milking in a milking hall of the fishbone type, 2x4. The only heated rooms are: social room, bathroom, milk cooling room and milking hall. In the cooling room there is a milk tank of 3200l capacity.
In shaping the architectural concept of the cowshed building, the main emphasis was put on preserving the traditional appearance of colonial homesteads in the landscape scale. The newly designed building resembles more a traditional barn than a cowshed from a distance. It was decided to do so for three reasons: the designed cowshed is the largest building in the homestead, and the largest buildings in traditional homesteads were always barns; on the extension of the lines marking out the designed building there used to be a barn, which was destroyed by fire; the already mentioned postulate to preserve the traditional appearance of homesteads. Thus, the function of the building is somehow hidden, only when approaching the farm is it possible to recognize that it is a cowshed building, mainly by the visible technical equipment and the layout of the gates.
Status: Unbuilt
Location: Stare Kawkowo, PL
Firm Role: main designer