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Architects: Rodrigo de la Cerda Arquitecto
- Area: 192 m²
- Year: 2021
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Photographs:Nico Saieh
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Manufacturers: Fabrica de Piedras Chilenas
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Lead Architect: Rodrigo de la Cerda Silva
“Trapenses House” was designed for a couple, and is located on a hillside in the middle of Los Trapenses Avenue, a residential neighborhood of Lo Barnechea commune, in Santiago, Chile. Part of the commission and challenge was to close off as much as possible from the avenue to reduce noise and provide privacy inside. And on the other hand, work on the pronounced slope.
My first approach was to work the land and its strong slope, taking into consideration two decisions: first I would obviously place the house on the south side, in order to rescue and generate gardens and terraces to the north and east. The second one already commissioned was to create a more hermetic facade towards the west, in which the avenue takes a side. This is how a work process begins, step by step, level by level, to build a relationship between the exterior and the interior, adapting the house to the existing terrain. Finally, the exterior would take 4 levels to go up together with the design of the house, always in absolute relation.
The first exterior level was naturally the access level, consisting of a large stone and concert-paved courtyard that connects with the entrance of the house and doubles as a parking area. Following this, I projected the gardens into the interior of the terrain, covering three different levels. But first, I designed a key element to level the heights of the terrain and help unite even more the interior to de exterior: it was the “Pool”. The purpose of this level is to unify the entire garden, while also dividing it into a more private lower garden and an upper garden that connects to the living and dining through a terrace with a built-in grill.
The interior design is mainly based on a central axis that distributes as the land goes up, from the entrance hall with a high ceiling up to the living/dining area on the top level. This main axis was later transformed into a central concrete volume, which contains a light courtyard. This courtyard has two functions: the first, discounting m2, since the regulations, due to having a significant slope, generated a 20% discount in ground occupation, which clearly limited from the beginning the exact m2 that I had to project on the floor. And on the other hand and more important, it provides natural light, tremendous spatiality, and transparency to the entire inside, in other words, from the moment you enter the house, going up until you reach the living/dining area. Moreover, this light courtyard gifts us a small skylight that illuminates the kitchen.
Once this main volume was established, I distributed simple and orderly volumes on both sides, in such a way the services areas were located toward the South, and the volumes of the master bedroom, office, and living/dining room were located toward the Northeast side. All the interior spaces were built with reinforced brickwork. To achieve the required thermal resistance, this was covered with manufactured engineered stone, a material chosen to complement the concert and give more character to the volumes.
Finally, these stone volumes are fitted in the main concert volume, creating an organized and complete volumetric, which transfer and shows the material both inside and outside the house, this is how an even stronger connection happens between the exterior and the interior is generated.
One of its stone volumes takes a protagonist role in the main façade, the master bedroom area which becomes a very important volume with a completely blind façade facing towards the avenue. This achieves the commission’s objective of closing off from the avenue and also opening up and protecting the interior. To achieve the correct level projected with respect to the garden, this volume had to be raised by a base of diagonal concrete beams, which leaves it with a feeling of being suspended in the air towards the parking area and gives even more character to the main façade.
