Water-Powered Saw Mill Visitors’ Centre, Ívó, Seklerland (RO)

Architect: Köllő Miklós
Text: Anthony Gall
Photos: Zoltán-Levente Erős, Vajk-István Szigeti, Miklós Köllő (Larix Studio)

In Seklerland, located on the western side of the Madaras Harghita of Madaras, there is a water-powered sawmill with a visitors’ centre besides Ivó stream, in the centre of the village Ivó. This facility was designed by Larix Studio (with senior designers Miklós Köllő and László Miklós Győrffy) completed in 2015. Once there used to be lots of facilities with a similar function. Waters running from the hills had been used with a technology inherited and maintained by several generations to transform the hidden potential and energy of the waterflow and power sawing with it. Desing task now was about to present these activities and technology of the past on a site where there had once stood such a facility for sure. However, there were no photos or other documents to rely on for the reconstruction, only the chance to study similar, still partly visible objects and to create a theory for the topic which also stands the test of practice. In this regard, the water-powered saw mill is not actually a reconstruction as such. It is not only an evocation of the past either. Primarily, it is an attempt to present a technology which is based on a sort of cloning of a similar plant the survival of which is authentically proven by documents.

Client: Zetelaka község
General architecture: Larix Studio
Architecture: Miklós Köllő, László-Miklós Győrffy
Structure: Levente Gurzó, Zoltán Kercsó
Technical expert: Nicolae Mondoc Bogdan
Main contractor: Faragó Kft
Historical experts: Tibor Csergő, György Balázs Dr.