Text description provided by the architects. Lan’ house is located at Road 5, Phuoc Tinh Ward, Long Dien Town, Ba Ria – Vung Tau Province, Viet Nam. When discussing with the owner, H2 ourself caught two main problems which be called body and soul of the house. First about the body of Lan’ house that our architects solved the needs of using which divided two parts of space clearly: the first floor for rice business and second floor for living most comfortably. All space of the first floor is in front of Road 5 so it’s suitable for developing Vietnamese traditional business best which along the large street or we call façade house.
The second floor holds enough functions of a home. There are two sides of the house that are separated with stair and lobby. Cause of facing large street where happens much noise and dusty business activity and want to avoid them, we use ventilation bricks to make style while close space. The architects also make a garden and void to get sunlight inside. The front side is the kitchen, dining room, living room and restroom with laundry. All rooms are bounded with a green garden. The behind side is two bedrooms with its own restrooms and a large terrace that connects two bedrooms each other and with grandparents together in a precinct.
There’s a big shape of wood which holds restroom and laundry between the living room and kitchen to avoid seeing thoroughly from each room to the rest. Every corner is a small green one for relax. The space from front to behind is closed and opened continuously to make interesting and conveniences. Such as the face of house is a closed cube for reducing dust and noise; the main space like kitchen, living room and dining room are opened freshly; bedrooms are closed privately; the terrace, in the end, is opened to connect bedrooms to bedrooms, house to house and connect three generations in a big family.
The soul of Lan’ house is pressed with two values: time and religion. The ground had an existing old house with a wood structure of roof that is still strong and was along owner’ childhood. So she wants to remain it as a present of time. Our architects treat architecture inside as traditional style combining with modern function to connect old roof structure and new building while respecting all detail of the roof structure. The owner is a Catholic so we research to repeat the details concerning about the church or crucifix. On the large wall, we make the color glass window, chink of light and dome of the wall, all combine with sunlight to celebrate a psychical and mysterious space.
