196: Markdale Farm

Markdale Farm is a single-family home by architect Brian O’Brian that extends the language of agricultural buildings into a contemporary domestic form.

Set on a 72-acre property in Markdale, Ontario, the project began after clients discovered O’Brian’s nearby Schoolhouse project and engaged him in 2021. What started as a modest renovation evolved into a full replacement of the small 1930s farmhouse, leading to a new 3250-square-foot home containing a principal suite, a secondary suite, and two bedrooms with a shared bathroom.

Arrival traces the lineage of the site. The route passes the original farmhouse, aligns with the steel drive shed, and turns at the century-old barn before meeting a 120-foot leaning corrugated steel wall. Perforated steel shutters conceal three long windows, and the entry slips through a carport carved from the steel-on-wood-frame bar. Inside, concrete and hemlock define every surface, carrying a steady material logic through the house.

At the entrance and Great Room, the long linear volume begins to bend and open, its walls splaying and its roof dipping and rising as if caught in mid-movement. As one travels deeper into the plan, the floor descends into the ground, lowering the horizon line and allowing the second floor to appear without presenting a heavy mass from the front. Toward the rear, the agrarian exterior yields to the warmth of the hemlock volume, culminating in a ridgeline that carries outward as a red element reaching toward the sky.

Geothermal heating, high insulation values, and precise structural coordination shaped a modern agrarian house design delivered with near-surgical accuracy.