Monks' life and its subordinate land use is embodied in the harmony of the landscape and the built environment: the hermitage sits at the highest point of the landscape, in its physical and mental center, geometrically centered with the church tower, surrounded by a system of retaining walls and fences. These walls and fences delimit and define areas and usage: they lead from doing raw physical work in nature to prayer in the cell chapel.
The ring of forest, stream, lake and swamp surrounding all directions is the place of the natural work: logging, fishing. This is the place of direct physical struggle with nature. As we going closer, we arrive to a kind of tamed forest, the orchard, which borders are fenced. These fences are the first man-made elements we meet. Inside the fence, retaining walls arrange the sloping landscape into useful, horizontal plateaus. This is the place of vegetables, of crops. There is already a lot of meticulous work here, you have to work densely and organized for the result. Water reappears as a source: wells, basins, irrigation canals.
Walls and fences getting enclosed, windows and doors appear. This is the monastery, the places of community: the infirmary and refectory, a church and small houses for each hermit. The area between the hermit houses is still common, but entering the garden of each house, one is already alone. The garden is a slice of its own landscape: open from above, exposed to the weather, but one can already shape it into one’s own image. The hermit cultivates it as he pleased. Entering through the door of the house nature is excluded, we are just surrounded only by our own artificial environment: individual work, eating, bathing and sleeping spaces. The chapel of the hermit's house is the innermost, most intimate space, the ultimate degree of retreat. But still a living place. The body of the deceased hermit is placed among his companions in the crypt, in the place of common prayer.
The uniform ensemble of the hermitage cannot be stronger as its current form and scale, does not require new built volumes, rather should be maintained. However, today’s man also needs to be able to live this path. Therefore, the visitor centre should be outside the fences: here we buy tickets, put off our clothes, go to the bathroom, eat. Getting to know the hermitage starts here: the simultaneous retreat can only be learned from an external point, thus the picture will be complete.
The ring of forest, stream, lake and swamp surrounding all directions is the place of the natural work: logging, fishing. This is the place of direct physical struggle with nature. As we going closer, we arrive to a kind of tamed forest, the orchard, which borders are fenced. These fences are the first man-made elements we meet. Inside the fence, retaining walls arrange the sloping landscape into useful, horizontal plateaus. This is the place of vegetables, of crops. There is already a lot of meticulous work here, you have to work densely and organized for the result. Water reappears as a source: wells, basins, irrigation canals.
Walls and fences getting enclosed, windows and doors appear. This is the monastery, the places of community: the infirmary and refectory, a church and small houses for each hermit. The area between the hermit houses is still common, but entering the garden of each house, one is already alone. The garden is a slice of its own landscape: open from above, exposed to the weather, but one can already shape it into one’s own image. The hermit cultivates it as he pleased. Entering through the door of the house nature is excluded, we are just surrounded only by our own artificial environment: individual work, eating, bathing and sleeping spaces. The chapel of the hermit's house is the innermost, most intimate space, the ultimate degree of retreat. But still a living place. The body of the deceased hermit is placed among his companions in the crypt, in the place of common prayer.
The uniform ensemble of the hermitage cannot be stronger as its current form and scale, does not require new built volumes, rather should be maintained. However, today’s man also needs to be able to live this path. Therefore, the visitor centre should be outside the fences: here we buy tickets, put off our clothes, go to the bathroom, eat. Getting to know the hermitage starts here: the simultaneous retreat can only be learned from an external point, thus the picture will be complete.