The hero view, from the edge of the tub at blue hour in light rain. Steam rises off the water in the round wooden tub. Mossy gritstone walls surround it, the setts are wet, and lanterns and a folded blanket sit on an oak bench. Beyond the low wall there are oak and birch trunks. Above on the left, the charred larch cabin has lit windows with books and plants behind them, a deep eave and an oak post. Off brief: the fire is an open fireplace built into the enclosure wall with logs stacked under it, where the brief has a wood-fired heater in a niche stoked from outside. The tub's rim also stands well above the setts, where the brief has the tub set 600 mm into the floor.

← the floor The Long Wall/spaces·if / 062

The tub enclosure

A roofless stone room at the west end of the wall, screened from the approach and open to the trees.

The card

spaces 03 of 04

The tub enclosure

spaces 03 of 04idea_062

The notes

rendered

The tub sits in a roofless stone room at the west end of the wall. The main wall screens it from the approach, so you are hidden from anyone arriving but fully open to the woods. It is the anchor of the whole idea, and the last thing to cut.

the walls

5.4 by 5.0 m. The walls are 2.8 m high on the north and west. The south side drops to a 0.9 m wall, so when you are sitting in the tub your eye line clears it and you look straight into the trees. The enclosure shares its east side with the cabin's stone core.

the tub

A wooden tub, 1.8 m in diameter, holding about 1,400 litres. It is set 600 mm into the floor, so you step down into it rather than climb up.

the heater

An external wood-fired heater sits in a niche cut into the west wall and is stoked from outside the tub. Expect 2 to 3 hours to get from cold to 38°C, so lighting it is part of the ritual on arrival.

underfoot

Gritstone setts laid to fall to a slot drain, so splashes never pool.

logs

A deep, dry recess in the enclosure wall, under a projecting stone shelf.

the way in

An oak door in the cabin's stone core opens straight from the enclosure into the warm lobby. Four steps from tub to towel.

the water

The tub is drained and refilled every few visits. The water is left to cool first, then sent to a planted soakaway rather than straight into the ground.

The tub, the heater and the enclosure fit-out are costed at £10k to £18k, driven mostly by the tub itself.

The drawings

1 sheet

Ground floor plan, sheet 02, at 1 to 100, north at the top. The stone core sits where the wall crosses under the cabin. Inside it are the plant room with the cylinder and laundry, a north entry door off the covered arrival, a stair of 14 risers rising west to east, and the stone lobby with an oak bench and a door west into the tub enclosure. The enclosure has the 1.8 m tub, the heater niche, the log store and a slot drain. Setts run under the whole cabin, which is drawn dashed at 6.6 by 11.4 m with an oak post at each corner, and the heat pump sits against the wall to the east. — 01 · Ground floor plan

The plates

2 · lift any one out

The south side at golden hour, from the woodland floor about 20 m away, with low sun coming through the trees from the left. The cabin is raised over the mossy gritstone wall on thick silver oak posts, with five tall panes of glass in dark frames glowing warm, a dining table and a fire visible inside, and a deep eave under the moss roof. On the left the wall steps up into the tub enclosure with steam rising from it. Bracken, mossy boulders and birch trunks fill the foreground. Off brief: as in the aerial, the cabin runs along the wall rather than across it, so its long glazed side faces south. The south elevation has the 6.6 m end facing south with four panes. — 02 · The south side at golden hour