According to Vienna-based architect Judith Benzer, the modern summer house needs a tranquil rural location, crisp country design and should be easy to close for the uninhabited winter season. Or so a look at her Summer House in Southern Burgenland, Austria, would suggest. Here, she has created a contemporary cottage – a home for a family that is pefect for weekends and holidays spent in the sun. With an exterior constructred purely from a grid of larch wood and a basic form inspired by traditional kellerstockel (wine houses that are typical in the surrounding area; the summer house is construced on top of hidden concrete foundations that conceal both a wine cellar and wine making facilities), the design gives a nod to the rustic. But this is no pretty pastiche of previous summer houses. Instead, with sharp edges created from copper corner plates and a series of shutters that when closed sit flush with facade, the building encapsulates the best of high design now. Functional (those shutters make closing the house for the winter season a breeze) and sympathetic to its environement (the all wood strucutre sits at ease in the surrounding countryside), Benzer’s summer house is a lesson in how to import cutting edge architecture into rural life.