“>WOLKE7 – Organic self-service farm store with integrated milking carousel
The Eisl family specializes in sheep breeding and the production and direct marketing of organic sheep milk products.
In order to optimize the workflow of the daily stable work and to provide an appealing and transparent sales area with a view of the farm, the family decided to expand their historic heritage farm ensemble with a one-story wooden building, deliberately moving with the times.
In the appealing self-service farm store, with organic products from all over Austria, visitors get a glimpse of the attached new milking house, where the 120 Eisl sheep, depending on the season, up to 2x daily. Carousel ride.
All surrounded by wood – for the benefit of man and beast.
The simple and elongated structure finds a common beginning or end in the floor plan with the existing barn. The same roof geometry in the form of a gable roof in combination with a similar roof pitch as on the existing building is intended to geometrically fraternize the two structures. In addition, the 3 large glass surfaces in a line along the length of the building stand for transparency and clarity – as does the apparent simplicity of the building with its reduced surfaces and flush details.
It was important and clear to all involved to use as much wood as possible, to save CO2 in the process and to make the best possible use of the raw material from the company’s own forest.
The building was constructed with a frame truss structure with suspended KLH (cross-laminated timber) panels from Fa. Binder from the Lungau region. Christoph Mösl, also a forestry worker and son-in-law of the owners, harvested the timber for all the beams, girders and battens himself.
The building was roofed with an innovative and resource-saving in-roof PV system made of German quality modules with a special frame. The extraordinary thing is that the system allows the substructure to be made of wood as well, instead of energy-consuming aluminum. In addition, the normal shingle roofing is no longer required, as the modules themselves form the dense roof cladding.
Heating and summer temperature control are provided by component activation in the monolithic floor slabs, supplied by the building’s own biomass heating plant and source.
The challenge in this project was to handle the cultural heritage with care and still allow for reinterpretation for further development. In brief, the goals were 1) to find answers to climate protection and feasible solutions on the farm, 2) to present products attractively to customers, 3) to give customers transparent insights into the farm, 4) to simplify work processes and offer appealing workplaces, 5) to improve animal welfare.
All this could be realized by the Eisl family together with the sons-in-law Christoph and Stefan Mösl and son Nikolaus Eisl, from the team of m3 civil engineers.
The milking house was put into operation in February 2022, and the WOLKE7 self-service store has been open since July 1, 2022.
The construction process was organized by the client himself. By the end of the year 2022, the building including outdoor facilities was completed. In 2023, more outdoor seating, glass washers, and a barrier-free restroom facility followed.
