JUST OFF ONE of Verbier’s famous pistes lies Antoine, a one-person hut that looks like a rounded rock. The Geneva-based architectural firm Bureau A designed the hut, which serves as an alpine shelter for the mountain’s visitors at 2,300 metres above sea level. The wooden frame is clad in concrete. The wood used is Swiss pine and the hut was built by a local company in the valley.
“Switzerland has a tradition of studying the Alps at close quarters, and you can certainly do that from the hut,” says architect Daniel Zamarbide of Bureau A.
In his novel Derborence, Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz describes a rockslide that engulfed the Lizerne valley in 1714. The lead character, Antoine, survived for seven weeks under the rocks before escaping. The hut is named in his honour.«
w| a-bureau.com
