Imenska Gorca
A house grown
into its slope.
Balsamia stands on the edge of Kozjanski Park, a few minutes from Podčetrtek, facing the valley. Relaxation in nature, modern architecture and botany.
We built four apartments
where twelve could have stood.
That's the whole idea.
There was room for twelve units. We built four. Each apartment is therefore larger, quieter and more private than it would otherwise be — with its own entrance and a terrace turned away from the neighbours.
That restraint is felt everywhere: in the width of the windows, in the space between the terraces, in never hearing a key from the apartment next door. Fewer rooms means more space for each guest.
The result is not a small hotel, but a house that becomes yours for a few days — with a view you do not have to share and a quiet no corridor interrupts.
— The Balsamia family
Principles
Three decisions
we didn't compromise on.
01
Architecture
Low, long and set into the slope, so the house reads as another line in the hillside rather than an object on it. Larch, lime plaster and a single generous opening per room.
02
Botany
The garden came before the interior. Lavender, sage and grasses frame the terraces, and the herb garden in front of the house is yours — cut from it whatever you like.
03
Silence
No reception, no restaurant, no corridor. Separate entrances, four keys and a slope that is quiet from dusk until the first birds.
Private wellbeing,
by the hour.
The next phase of the house: a sauna, a cold pool and a quiet room set into the garden — reserved for one apartment at a time and never shared.
Guests
“We came for two nights and rearranged the rest of the trip to stay four. The silence is a luxury; everything else is beautifully measured.”
“Architecturally serious, but never cold. The morning light in Aurelia is worth the drive on its own.”
“An afternoon at Terme Olimia, a bottle from Virštanj on the terrace and not a sound after ten. Flawless.”