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Architects: Koutsoftides Architects
- Area: 344 m²
- Year: 2007
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Photographs:Agisilaou & Spyrou
Text description provided by the architects. The plot is located in a sub-urban area of Paphos town . These areas consist of plots usually 22X24M and it is the result of a fixed , anachronistic legislation for years . This has had as a result a sub-urban development of houses allowing hardly any green areas due to another part of the legislation that allows buildings to reach 3M from the neighboring boundaries.
With the modern family being more demanding these houses are covering the full percentage of building factors , allowing less and less free space.
Bearing this in mind and also having the neighboring properties occupied , our aim was to design a house that allows the occupants max. privacy , sun protection and if possible more free space.
The latter was not achieved due to the addition of a pool. So we have proposed vertical vegetation screens which they create shading and privacy. The house , despite it’s contemporary lines has a lot of “hidden” Cypriot traditional elements such as tall ceilings , to facilitate air circulation , lightweight floor construction , to create flexibility , massive ground floor structure , to create anti-seismic stability and other.
The house is closed towards the road , with hardly any openings .Most of the openings are oriented south east , towards the exterior areas, the patio and the pool , facing the vegetal screen. Likewise, we have achieved cool interior spaces through various types of screening filtration of the sunlight and, allowing the air conditioning to function only when is very humid we managed to cool down the volumes by having heavy exterior insulation.
The winter sun is welcomed during the day hours helping the house to minimize oil consumption. Thus ,the insulation contributes to a certain economy to the family and confortable living.