Text description provided by the architects. A large volume of white extended walls that recreates the trees on the lot preserving family privacy that connects with portions of forest ... lots of heaven…lots of wáter.
The lot is located in a gated neighborhood near the central area of the city of Córdoba and it showed great contrasts ... .an irregular exposing corner lot that challenged us to preserve home life ... .an ancient dense forest of native trees occupied half of the land, opposite to a plain stripped of vegetation.
The challenge and exploration of the work aimed to amalgamate the light of the land with the programmatic needs of housing ... the forest, its shadow, its intimacy ... and the plain, its light, its expansion as a vacuum to overturn in architecture. A serene family life of four members with an active social life. Thus, the skin is the element that condenses this dialectic as a contact membrane between the inside and the outside, assuming the responsibility to face different requirements as a whole.
We decided to consider the work in a stereotomic way, thereby we established and reinforced a concrete boundary between public and private. Pure white ceramic block masonry volumes lightly suspended soil barely were thought to connect the inner and outer spaces according to the demands of interior activities. As subtle counterpoint to the white walls, rusty sheets of iron act as a filter in these turning points, mobile panels that regulate access, lighting, privacy, from the full opacity to the transparency of the perforated surfaces.
The green landscape and the folds of the topography that we had built complete the proposal to set up a private space that reviews the patio paradigm. The requirement of considering the water as part of the family activities throughout the year brought about a large water mirror that connects the social spaces of the house and extends to the barbecue. In summer it enjoys the outdoors in the sun meanwhile the house offers shelter in winter with the help of solar and heating systems.
The culmination of the work relied on local construction systems and reinforced concrete masonry. The strategy aimed to differentiate private to social places, a smaller spatial scale and the presence of the walls capture visuals; and a more permeable social space characterized by large beams that support the roof and the wall of the main façade, hanging over and diluting the limits, large aluminum frames open the space to the family yard.
The proposal optimizes the relationship between the geometry of the lot, its landscape, the programmatic requirements of housing and our spatial intentions. Most private housing sectors directly link with the forest in the zero plane ...they have direct contact with the tree and on the terrace. On a larger scale, social spaces are connected to the empty open place... the reference of the tree is at the distance ...it is sculptural.
