This is Relevant to My Interests

Texts about   'Stories of Houses'

Elif ARAÇ

'Maison à Bordeaux', by Rem Koolhaas

Rem Koolhaas desinged this project for the handicapped person who had a car accident and can’t live without wheelchair now. This interesting design is the result of the tragical accident that the family had.

While desinging the house, Rem Koolhaas was probably thinking about the accessibility of the living spaces by wheelchair. I think that ‘ freedom of the handicapped’ means being free in his own living space, the possibility of easefully movement in his/her world which is his own house.

I can say that Rem Koolhaas designed the elevator platform for meeting the handicapped man’s needs. He interpreted the wheelchair as an extension of man’s body. The line of vision was really effective.

In abstract ‘ access to freedom’ is the main idea of this respectful design.  

'House in Lège', by Anne Lacaton and Jean Philippe Vassal

Carrying on the spirit of nature in architectural design!

When the siblings wanted to have a holiday house, they requested to preserve the 46 special trees which are in their own site. The architects had got a perfect starting point with the only desire of siblings.

The architects wanted to stick to nature of the site, protect the shape of dunes by their intelligent solution: Floor has to raise from earth.  The design was made as a raising house without harming the enviroment. Those ideas to preserve environment are the best ways of connection with ‘green’.

‘Living with trees and feeling nature in the house’ is in the forefront of the design.  The trees create a calming, relaxing effect in the house. Maybe the house  became livable under these circumstances.

Architecture and nature have got a special intersection which humans also belong to. I believe that Anne Lacaton and Jean Philippe Vassal designed to bring nature and arcitecture into balance.

Texts about “Stories of Houses” by Ziba Akarcali

House in Plum Grove, Tokio

By Kazuyo Sejima

“Light, clean and white, no bravodo at all”

These qualifies were the things what Makeita Family was looking for with an architect and his/her designs. In so far as Kazyuo Sejima and her works had those qualifies, she was “the chosen one” for the new Makeita house.

This house is a place to relax, something spiritual which has a soul for itself by its design. I can clearly say that the most important element of this design is respect to the owner’s ideas. In order to taking the social statue of the family into account, Sejima designed a family house by overcoming the conventional residence understanding: A modest, clean, underlying design which interacts with its context.

By using interpretation, Sejima created a house which has new possibilities for the users inside. She had put the stereotypes aside and with the courage she took from the Makeita family, she made something elastic, something has power to change and the power which comes from the family, from the way they wanted to live. With all of these qualifies, this house is worth to talk about and admire.

Rogers’ House, Wimbledon

By Richard Rogers

It’s their luck that the only son of Rogers Family was an architect because nobody can know the history and demands of the family better than a member of the house. With the influences from an artist, fashionable mother and a medical doctor father who had an identity of a scientist, Richerd Rogers probably the best choice for the design.

While putting the “small, flexible house” idea and the historic elements together, he used materials to express this mixture. Also he carried an old rhetoric of Ernesto Rogers, who was a part of the family and also family’s history, to the present with the materials. He created a family place for his own, with contemporary materials and historic elements, but that’s not all of course. He knew what his parents wanted and needed, the basic element that a designer needs while designing.

Clean, plain facades with Bauhaus style furnitures inside is the result of interference that Richard Rogers created by his background. This result has sentimental value from the mind of its design.

STORIES O HOUSES, Raquel Plaza

Stories of Houses / 2 story selected

The most cruciaI thing that I realised during readings of these stories is ‘establishing connections’. All the time, human search for a life flavored by valuable things.  At this point, architecture comes to the stage as a star of the night. It provides the life people want for themselves and have the essence of their own cultures.

Ernest Mourmans’ House / Belgium / Ettore Sottsass

House for a family with a collection of art works and endangered birds. By designing sequence of interconnected buildings, a fusion is created with daily life, birds and art works.

In Ernest Mourmans’ house, architecture was shaped by two different collections –art works and endangerd birds-  of the family. Daily life, exterior of house and collections are blended in a proper way.  Art is a way of life. Putting art works in to a seperate place and isolating from the life extinguishes the soul of art. Art works want to be with curious eyes all the time, as in the Mourmans’ house.  Also combining with the birds, house becomes perfectly living organism with “life” and “art”.

A Family House at Riva San Vitale / Switzerland / Mario Botta

In the house at Riva San Vitale, the interior is blended with the beautiful nature of exterior. Also, by using the local materials and vernacular architecture, the values of cultural elements are maintained.  The interesting point of this house is that the arcitect started to design from the top. Entering from the top and going down for the private areas like bedroom. The old bird hunting tower was transformed to a house, following an unusual way. While going down the stairs, one can see all the amazing natural environment with differentiating views.

A building becomes an art work when it tells a story and has a soul, gathering things in a harmonic way and in these two houses, architects completed the pieces of the puzzle to reach the final picture.

Hilal Aksu / Group-3

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Naked House en Kawagoe, de Shigeru Ban

An important aspect of Shigeru Ban's research is to find new ways of living. He quickly built camps to the refugee people of earthquakes Kobe and Turkey.

The house comes from a commission whose condition was to encourage ties between family members.

Since my point of view, it is very interesting the solution that he finds for this purpose, which consisted of a translucent shed-like structure carries a continuity of space. It sees only broken by four mobile dwellings that provide partial privacy to the unit. The idea of the change of space reaches such an extreme that they can move, remove, rotate ... even be taken off the premises, the garden. The next room may be occupied by different people of the house and it never stays still.

That tie of the spaces in one suggests a common experience under the same roof, or "morada". For the Japanese culture, it also develops the concept of floor as a communication place where they can connect and interact.

Casa en Lège, de Anne Lacaton y Jean Philippe Vassal

The request of this house it is done for two brothers who took into account the beauty and fragility of the place where they wanted to spend their holidays. They had grown up in the area of the work. They appreciated his natural value with a special form. Also, they had seen how the neighbors transformed and destroyed the landscape to build their houses.

According to what I had said before, I find very interesting the challenge that it is propose to the architects to preserve fully the nature of the site, the vegetation and shape of the dunes.

The solution is quite intelligent because they raise the house to not remove shrub vegetation and in turn, it provides the house views of the bay. With regard to trees and their way through the house, my first intuition coincides almost entirely with the architects that, to allow movement and for waterproofing, decide to put on the tree a sheet  larger than the cavity that cap, attached to the house by gums.

Although the ideas were good, I do not find attractive the final appearance.

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Dudley Jones:

Maison a Bordeaux

This design by Rem Koolhaus is particularly interesting for me because of its unique narrative.  The house itself was design for a man who had been in a car accident and became wheelchair bound. He expressed that he would like a complicated house, for it was going to be his world. This is interesting because it contradicts the norm. The two most interesting aspects of this house for me is the lift and its 'unstable' construction which both relate deeply with the client. For example, the lift or hydraulic platform in the house makes part of the kitchen on the ground floor, which is half carved into the landscape; on the first floor it completes the room which has been designed with three hundred and sixty degree views for contemplation. As the lift travels up it forms the remainder of a study that is in the master bedroom. This lift is an indispensible part of the clients life, much like the wheelchair is an extension of the body for the disabled man. The second symbolic point, is the way in which the structure has been design - deliberately with three supporting columns, one of which, the spiral staircase is off centre creating an unstable house. To overcome this design suggestion, a beam was placed over the house with a tensile member anchoring the house to the ground via the beam. It was asked 'what happens if the cable is cut?' The answer is that the house will fall. This is in direct comparison to the client. Both the house and the man in his wheelchair relies on a cable to function.

The U-House in Tokyo, by Toyo Ito

This story has another very emotive narrative. The house was designed for Toyo Ito's sister who had lost her husband to cancer. It was completed in 1976 and demolished in 1997.

How do you build a house for a widow? This is an intriguing question. Originally the client lived in a high density tower block and after her husband's death she requested that Ito build her a house close to the soil and plants, something their previous house had lacked. At the time of design there was a plot available next to the house of the Architect. This site was selected because the client wanted to reunite with her family. The interesting thing about the design is that it went from being practical, to one that represent a symbolic value, so rather than an 'L' shaped building, A 'U' was proposed. This was to create greater lighter effects within the building and create a stronger relationship with the inhabitants.

The idea was that there would be two long corridors connected by a 'U'. The corridors were dark to symbolise a place of mourning whereas the 'U' was light for dining and playing. The structure contains cracks in the wall, to allow light in and cast shadows on the white walls.

One interesting point about this house is the time or life of the house. After 21 years it was demolished. It was built to provide a place to overcome the tragedy of her husband's passing, the demolition represents that it is time to move on with their lives. The time for mourning is over. A powerful new progression.

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Juan Antonio Alvarado

House of Riva San Vitae, Mario Botta.

The project is based on the re-interpretation of ancient constructions, the Roccoli, that are traditional bird’s towers of hunting. Botta managed to adapt a tower without damaging the natural surroundings and obeying his friend’s petitions to have views to the lake Lugano and having contact with the ground. One of the principal objectives for Mario Botta was to propose a capable house to mark the limit to the so extension neglected of the village and to protect the forest. Through this project, just after the construction of the house, a new order of urban planning declared as protected green area environment.

The house is a tower squared of ten meters displaced to one side and thirteen of height organized about a central stair. The spiral path shows a succession of views .The house is like a volume carved with four upright projections that respond to the surroundings. In this way Botta conceives the architecture like a place's design, relating interior spaces and exteriors.

Naked house in Kawagoe, Shigeru Ban

            The house that Shigeru Ban in Kawagoe proposes is put in the center in the idea of a diaphanous space to foment the links between the members of a family instructed by three generations. The customer decided to explore the importance of a common zone where they may communicate the different generations and to relate to each other.

            Shigeru Ban took like piece of information of departure the significance that the Japanese tradition bestows upon the word "morada" : The rooftop, that the place's atmosphere symbolizes the idea of door between the sky and the land, that is, the ground of the traditional Japanese house that form splits of the furniture and that is where they generate  themselves the majority of activities. The pole is of attraction.

            The project is based on a common space and only envelope which the spaces of privacy decrease minimally becoming four cubicles like movable bedrooms that they move around on some wheels. Traditional Japanese idea and loft's idea that way get related.

            The house is not deliberate like a permanent house but like a place where his inhabitants remain temporarily until you change his reality.

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Juan José Ruiz

Aktion Poliphile House, Studio Granda

The fact that this house is conceived from the beginning as a typical home, a home where any of us could live in, I find it even more interesting then to start a project with a factor that will decide everything.

Instead, the agents that will condition this play are strictly basic for any other, except for the dual human condition of good and evil that will exist as a physical part of the house.

I realize when reading this story that some architecture lacks dynamism, the ambiguity between its parts that can enhance its detail and understand the meaning of a part thanks to the existence of the other, as life itself. Each person is made up of vice and virtue, and the fact of living is like wandering from one to another. The monotony is equivalent to a pause, a state in which there is no movement, everything is static while time is creating and destroying everything in its path. In this house, Margrét Harðardóttir and Steve Christer, get the necessary dynamic situation using two Gods (Saturn and Delia), or rather, what they symbolize. On the other hand, Saturn´s home which is smaller, robust and solid gets us closer to the most primitive and dark side of human beings. But this tour that sometimes deprives us from the sight of the rest of the house, will gradually approach us to Delia's house, thats bigger, lighter, modern and colorful. It is interesting how the transition from one to another is done by the exterior and through the contact with nature, allowing for a special approach to the opposite house. The smell of vegetation, the geometry of both houses, the image they reflect help understand one from the other. This definitely creates a dynamism by one single run thats linked and gives life to the housing itself.

Frank Gehry House, California

I´ve always found interesting Marcel Duchamp´s points. That is why, at first, this story caught my attention because of the resource that Frank Gehry uses to surround the main pink house to give it  more character and expose it as if it were a work of art. This is sumed up later with an overlappin of ideas that the architect wants to show in his project and achieves to understand properly and economicly (using industrial materials). This way theres several contradictions that generate interest in this project. The clear difference between the new and the old, the experimentation with these types of materials and the appearance of a house into another that generates a set.

This project at first glance collides directly with society and culture of houses, but examining it, you can appreciate it as different aspects of modern life and are present in every detail: industrial materials, prefabricated, dynamism, frenetic life, undecided future ... And this last aspect is the one I find most relevant. We´re used to a life changing, moving and globalized, new infrastructures, transportation that takes you anywhere in the world, etc ... However, we all want to have our own home for life itself when our life isnt the same during the course of time. Frank Gehry's house is an unfinished project that adapts to different life situations that create possibilities and is in constant motion. The house may not be the same 20 years later, but it will also mean that our life isnt either.

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PROYECTOS 4. 21/09/2012

NEUS GIMÉNEZ AGULLÓ

THE NAKED HOUSE BY SHIGERU BAN & VILLA ANBA BY PETER BABER

        These houses were built in as far off places as distant are the cultures for which they were designed. So it is absolutely expected that they take shape in completely different forms, but there’s a common trace; both, architects and clients, were seeking  new ways of inhabit, based on how people socialize.

        Firstly, Naked House in Kawagoe responds to the intention of encouraging the relationship between the member of a three generation family, retaining some of the tradicional Japanese concepts as the floor importance, house undestanding a temporary element or milky white light typical of rice paper screens. But it performs a completely open space were people continuously interact and privacy space are minimazed to four mobile cubicles. It's mesmerazing thinking about that little white pieces moving around the space, sort of a ball, which brings flexibility and a deep knolege of everything and everyone in the house

        Secondly, Villa Anbar in Dammam is set in a very different enviroment where the relations between people are strongly influenced by class and sex hierarchy. So in opposition to Naked House there are very few common spaces and as is tradicional  in Arabia Saudi, men and women’s quarters are separated, but Baber has broken this by simple acts like introducing the other side’s gaze into the men’s enclosed space. 

        To sum up, the way these projects materialize how each family understands social relationships and the hability of shaping emotions between them is brilliantly done and is one of the more interesting aspects to my mind.

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José Manuel Rodríguez Cañizares

Ben van Berkel, Möbius House

The history of this House impressives because of the fact that a few customers undertake an architect a house "that created a new architectural language". Asking for an order of that magnitude is a challenge, but it is an interesting proposal by the customer.

The difficult final resulted in a house where the usual spatial and functional relations disappear, giving solution to an unusual residential program that responds to the new ways of life.

The sensation experienced by the inhabitants of the House is the have the privilege to be walking around the field, while they are at their job place and at home, all at the same time.

The loop built in concrete through which the architect trace movements develops a singular logic, based on this infinite form of Möbius. This makes the inhabitants life to flow, isolated or together, depending on your needs throughout the day, since reserves the space required for all daily activities.

This is an example which teaches us an important lesson: sometimes, the best proposals make them customers. Resulting in a multipurpose place, in which converge and develop all aspects of life. I think that Ben van Berkel really got the challenge.

Toyo Ito: U House

Firstly, however I like this house, I would not live there, because it does not responds to my current needs.

However, the way it attracts to me is the main idea and the realization of the project. It is an abstract work conceived for the calm. It was conceived as a response to an event such as death, was inhabited to combat the desolation.

The yard is the place for the memory, a mention about the absent daughter. That is the representation about timeless: where the time can be trapped, frozen, cancelled. Its appearance is always bleak.

However, the habitable perimeter includes the presence of the temporal and the contemporary. This clean and hard interior I think produces the intensification of the family relationships.

When the daughters grew up they were raised to sell it, because the conscience of the House form in each one of them.

Therefore, it not had another destination better for this architecture than the demolition. I think that it was destroyed once it played the role had been entrusted. It was a funeral home, which had a victim destination.

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LUIS ORTIZ MARTíNEZ

THE U-HOUSE , Toyo Ito

I found this house interesting not so much for the house itself, but by the story of a family after losing a parent, they need to start a new life in a home that would help them reunify again. The organization was based on symbolic values ​​of space and resulted in a concrete construction of "U", in which the ends of the house were the mother's room and daughters, connected by dark corridors that leading to curve of "U", which had a large window filled with light all the room. 21 years had to pass until the family was ready to reestablish links with the outside world. The first to leave the house was the oldest daughter, later did the mother and little daughter finally. The house was finally demolished and Toyo Ito explains that although physically the house no exists, it does’t matter, because he's seen as a stage in the life of the family, a way that helped them to overcome those difficult moments, and now that house still remains in the consciousness of the three family members.

MOEBIUS HOUSE IN AMSTERDAM, by Ben van Berkel

The reason why I find interesting this house is the way to resolve the intention of creating a home that have to be familiar life with the life work of both members and the relationship between the two spaces. The family apart from wanting a home that transmits a new architectural language, also wanted an intimate relationship with nature because they would work from home and wanted to spend time with their children. To solve the relationship between these spaces, Ben van Berkel found the solution in the Mobius strip, symbol related to the idea of ​​infinity, which wanted to get a continuous curve, without beginning or end, having the two studies at the ends opposite of the house, related with the rest by a continuous path. The desire to commune with nature is achieved by low and elongated forms of housing and glass enclosures.

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Fabrizio vizzi

Blas house – Alberto Camp Baeza

The insteresting thing in “Blas House” by Alberto Campo Baeza is his research of the form only from the concept.

It’s no important the beauty of the architecture, but the real essence of the will of the client.

The basament, in fact, isn’t beautiful, but it has a big meaning: some small windows allow at the people to see only a small part of the landscape, and you can only think what can be in the outside, allowing you to live at 360° the house.

But when you want to get in touch whit the nature, leaving the materiality of the house, you have to go in the upstair. Here you will be welcomed by a light space, fully glazed, where you can stay in silent, and feel part of the nature.

House in a plum grove – Kazuyo sejima

The house born in a plum trees garden, with the concept of wanting to build something that is only a temporary shelter for their 2 children, because when the children leave the family house, they will not be sad.

Kazuyo sejima has created a family house on 3 levels: a white cube in a corner of the garden.

The particular concept in that there are not clear distinction from the rooms.

Everything is shared. Nobody has his own room, or wardrobe; everything is of everybody.

In the house’s walls there is big opening which act as “visual bridges” towards the windows, that see in the outside. Everything is related to the other. I think that is no good to live in this home, everyone need his own space, his own stuff, and can personalize his room as he sees fit.

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Águeda Contreras García

House in Lège (Anne Lacaton and Jean Philippe Vassal) 

& 

A Family House at Riva San Vitale (Mario Botta)

          There are different ways to consider the connection of architecture with the surrounding environment, with the existing landscape to building this. For House in Lège, by Anne Lacaton and Jean Philippe Vassal, this relationship is one of respect. This is not to occupy as little space as possible, or hide in the ground, it is that building and environment come together; it is that they live in harmony. The landscape is not just the trees or topography of land, is a set of all elements that are present in it is the sensations produced and stored memories. All this must be preserved.

          Before this house was on the ground this was a place where the whole family used to picnic during the summer months, a place that children used to make huts among the trees, a place to walk. These activities can be done yet, and the spectacular views and new uses that brings the house.

          But respect for the landscape can not only be influenced by a single building, but by a set. That is, excessive urbanization of a place can end up destroying their magic. An example is the House in Riva San Vitale, by Mario Botta. Due in part to protest Botta through its powerful architecture, shortly after the construction of the house, a new ordinance declared urban planning and environment and forest green. This failed to stop excessive urbanization and the consequent destruction of the landscape.

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Claudia Carrisi

BLAS HOUSE in Sevilla La Nueva ( Madrid ), Alberto Campo Baeza

The house was intended by the architect and his client Francisco De Blas, who wanted that the structure of the house were the emotions and thought. This work represents the way to create somethings that really satisfied the requests of the client. His desire was to live in a place where you can listen to music without any distractions, in silence. To understand that de Blas gave a book of poems by Luis Cernuda to Campo Baeza, thanks to wich the architect was ale to understand the desires of the client. So the art of music and poetry are an integral part of the creative process of the work, the idea starts from an emotional process that involves the client and the architect too. The site, apparentli hostile, seemed however perfect for the silence necessary. The concrete box is the place of the estrangement from the city and all that surround us, the glass box is a place where you can enjoy the natural landscape.

U-HOUSE in Tokyo, Toyo Ito

The U.House is a residence in concrete commissioned by the sister of the architect, aftet the death of her husband. The building is thought as a plase to mourn and where the widow and her doughters can geta way from the outside world to live in close contact with their emotions. The structure expresse exactly this emotional state and it is so melanchonic. This is the state of mind of the family, the sense of emptiness and lack. The light and the sound help to create spaces and play of shadows that accompany the inhabitants of the house in a research emotional, yhay ended twenty years later, when the threewomen are ready to continue their life outside. The spirit of the U-House continues in a sort of Virtual Shelter for the woman and the architect.

The psychological impact of this house is really strong, is the symbol of a history of pain and it is full of this meaning.

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Silvia Capone

HOUSE IN LEGE,  BY ANNE LACATON AND JEAN PHILIPPE VASSAL

House in Lége is an example of harmony and fusion between architecture and landscape. It isn’t the nature that adapts and changes the architecture, but the architecture that penetrates into the nature and is perforated by it. Here architecture and nature are perfectly embedded.

The supporting structure seems to be constituted from six pines crossing the house and raise from the ground. Trees aren’t immobilized but free to move with the wind through a frame of rubber and Plexiglas. The nature grows up in the house.

The glitter of water is reflected by the aluminum sheeting. It illuminates the space below the house and creates an artificial sky.

Clients want to preserve this place of memories, not touching any tree. So their memory are materialized in what is the dream of every child: a shelter between trees.

The essence and the concept of this house are so exciting, but it’s esthetic is not so good. Maybe the use of wood could transform its aspect and get this structure in a better harmony with the natural contest.

It seems to be a temporary structure that can be easily removed without destroying or modifying the landscape, the beauty and the fragility of the earth.

The sign of the architecture is delicate and painless for the nature.

THE U-HOUSE IN TOKYO, BY TOYO ITO

The U-House is a monument that symbolizes the pain and loneliness of a specific family, after the death of a loved one.

The architect creates an intimate space, but also private and negative. The house is closed from the outside world and isolated from inside. It’s a large tube where shadows and sounds live. It’s a place of memory and pain, where the life of this family is suspended between past and present. It’s a sort of a therapy house.

The sense of anguish and meditation is made better by the presence of white walls, ceiling and floor, two dark corridors and the slope of the roof facing the inner courtyard (brown earth and weeds).

The house recreates the empty and feeling heard by the family, a state of mind long but temporary.

The family has shared here mourning for about twenty years, after this time has felt the need to leave this place and destroy it. The family continued to live together but now in a virtual house.

The U-House is a house that goes beyond the materiality and physicality. Its real essence is this family and its spiritual sharing.

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Alba María Castillo Marqués

 House in Baião, by Eduardo Souto de Moura

        The concept of nature integrated into architecture or, rather, integrated architecture in nature, is something that always drew my interest. The Baiao House is a neat way of merger between the artificial and the organic. Furthermore, as in the house Lège, we see a respect for what exists, 'add instead of destroy'.

         All this means that there is continuous dialogue between nature and architecture, a congeniación between these two parts so distinct in appearance. It is therefore very interesting such annexation as this results in the appearance of new visual and tactile textures, which evokes certain feelings in us that would not be possible without this union.

        On this home is just the degree of acceptance of nature and architecture that the house itself seems to be part of the terrain, which makes the only light source and the link between the inside and the outside is a large window in the principal facade main generating, from inside the house, a vision of the landscape as if it were a painting.

           In this way, we see possible a form of architecture that focuses on respect for nature and which makes it absurd to have to destroy in order to project.

 House in Lège (Anne Lacaton and Jean Philippe Vassal)

The concept that most strikes me about this building is that of 'integrate without destroying'. A concept that until several years ago seemed not considered how something did not seem possible, if we do not like something, we threw down and do something new to our liking.

A house with such as this level of immersion in nature is worth admiring. The elevation of the same on the ground and on bushes 3 meters high, makes the house wants to create a metamorphosis with trees so tall and, in fact, the trees are introduced into it wants to say that this metamorphosis can be created easily without suffering by either party.

The architects create harmony between the house and the landscape makes this house a space that could be defined as 'in-out', a space that goes into nature and that in turn makes the same envelope, promoting continuous symbiosis between dead architecture and living nature.

The theme of ecological architecture, natural, sustainable ... is a topic that gain awareness and educate future generations so that life, as we know it, to be something that can be maintained in the future.

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Macu de la Vega Cartagena 

VILLA BOLLEN in Holland, by One Architecture

I´ve chosen this house because it seems to me to be very interesting the way in which the extension of the same one has been carried out.

In a beginning the owners wanted a style of French country house, but with the passage of time, the family chose a house that did intense relation with the nature.

The extension supposes a great contrast so that was a completely different style of construction.

Nevertheless in spite of the contrast of styles we can observe that also respects the old style. This is achieved with visual adptacion perfectly suited to both constructions.

Finally, with the diaphanous and light interior of the first house there is obtained this visual perfect continuation that connects the interior with the nature.

On the question of if it is possible to speak really about a style, personally I think so, probably not a concrete style but the different, original one, adapted to the needs of the owners.



VILLA SAINT-CAST in Brittany, by Dominique Perrault

This house has seemed to me so interesting for since it is managed to integrate in the nature while respecting the environment.

It´s a refuge that allows the contact with the outside, landscape.... and depending on the season varies the landscape transmitting this way different sensations.

In addition you can enjoy a privacy which can be modified across a game if mobile partitions that create the espace wished for every moment.

Thanks to these dispositions we can enjoy the nature being refuged also of climate if we wish it.

It´s impressive as the refuge is created to blend with nature, without changing the lanscape and simultaneously respecting the environment.

When at last, Dominique were contemplating the model of the project that presumably would answer all their questions, he asked himself: This house, is it really a house? Well, my answer is clearly yes, he got what it wanted, the desired feeling of freedom

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Eduardo González Vázquez

Alberto Campo Baeza. Blas’s House

In this project Campo Baeza understood and makes a good job with the request of the customer. He makes an architecture that don’t have any damage on the nature just the opposite he does something to watch the nature inside that, it making that the customer has complete freedom in the way of understood or see that. He helps to give transparency and simplicity to the concrete box with this materials. This is a project that fall in love all the people, because it’s answer the night life at the box, betweens walls, while the diurnal life is on the platform that is in the middle of a mountain and you forget the box at the same time you are watching the nature. This project is like another project like “La casa del Horizonte” of “Jesus Aparicio” that like the Blas’s house it’s made in the middle of a mountain and the two projects have a concrete box and over the box have a light structure of steel and glass.



Shigeru Ban. Naked House

The proyect is one of the main house of a new model of architecture based in changing houses. That’s changes can be able many types of interpretations of the house, houses where the user define the function of the house at different moments of the day. This kind of architecture supposed the start of houses that will be used like specific stays, not for stay the whole day inside that, for example, a house for a researcher or a student, because they are a kind of people that they stay an important part of the day out of the house and they only stay at home for sleep or for study. That project is like the Drawer House that has only one room where the costumer can take the furnitures inside the wall ande he makes the use that he wants.

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Alvaro Madero Carrasco

House in Beaurdeux, Rem Koolhaas.

Along my few years studying architecture I had the chance to approach to the story of this house, and every time becomes more exciting, not for its aesthetic or its architectonic quality, that can be argued, but for the very singular situation of the customer

This house has no meaning without its habitants. And I’m not only thinking about the father, I mean that is a house built for the mother and their children. Each one lives their house in a completely different way because it was designed with such purpose.

There is no doubt to me this is the more restricted house because the personal story of its occupants, and that’s why I think this house represents this ??

houses in San Matías neighbourhood (Granada) , Juan Domingo Santos.

To be honest, what attracted me to this story was that it happens in my land, Granada, and its author is a very interesting architect to me. Thanks to this I could take a look to the fascinating story this project was hiding.

Is such a revolutionary idea and at the same time without originality that catch attention. Revolutionary because creates another scene to built a home and without originality because it happened like that trough al the history. In fact, after read the story came to my mind the memory of my mother childhood´s house which I had the opportunity to visit two years ago: The house was between houses, so the only way to grow was buying neighbor’s rooms, but in ascendant way, and the house was quite a long stair with rooms beside.

What begins to be a curiosity choice, becomes a very personal choice.

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Sergio Navarro García

The house of the Rain. Juan Navarro Baldeweg 

This is the first house which designed Juan Navarro Baldeweg for his brother. I think which is interesting that he used three basic materials to build the house: the Stone, the glass and the copper.  Juan Navarro thinks that the house should open to the countryside and the view of the valley. For this reason, the shape of the house is in U and opens the two wing of the house for open to the valley. In my opinion, I think that is interesting the relations between the house and the countryside, because I think that one house built opposite to the view and the terrain, is absurd. All wall of the house, except the curved wall, have panoramic windows, for looking the horizon. With this, I think that he creates a big contrast in the hall of the house, between the curved wall and the biggest window.  Also, I think that the house use the natural light and reduce the energy consumption.

On the other hand, the house is a resonant box. When it rains, the drops of water fall in the copper roof and produce sound to resonant into the house. I think that this sound can be unpleasant for example, at the time to sleep.

Casa Barrio de San Matias . Juan Domingo Santos

Everyone have room or part of them house that they want change. But some people also think what room of neighbor house can use to make this change. In the San Matias neighborhood, in Granada happened this case. Juan Domingo and “La Coja”, spoke with her neighbor and they made a series of change to part of them house. I think that this case is very interesting, because for example, you have a little house which don’t have windows in a room, you speak and make a pact with your neighbor, and  you can make a window which open in the garden of your neighbor. I think that this situation is very important in different cities of the word, especially in the historical center of the cities where the plot of land is very small.  

Also I think is interesting the life into the patio. In this case, the patio is similar to a square where the neighbor can stay in the outside, but is a “private” space.  In this way, it create “public space” in the “private space”.
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Manuel Sempere Díaz

HOUSE IN A PLUM GROVE –Kazuyo Sejima-

It is difficult to reach general conclusions about this house because there has been much experimentation with the limits and connections between spaces. The architect, who had been educated in the profession to question everything established, implemented this spirit when she was distributing the house partitions and communication between them, questioning the validity of the model established until that moment.

All this must be done in accordance with the expectations of the family, whose desire was a light house, white and devoid of ostentation, a place to relax the mind.

The result is a house with a lot of freedom of movement and fluid communications between the different rooms but, at the same time, reaching an intense sense of intimacy. This shows the similarities of the design with the characteristic style of Japanese culture. We can see this on the minimal thickness of the walls, which is common in Japanese architecture where wood has always been the most used material. Therefore, the separations become something almost nonexistent. The Japanese spirit is evident in the simple details, the lack of ornamentation and its apparent opposition to technological noise (technology is used but not in an obvious way).

DICK’S HOUSE –Jean Nouvel-

The house was commissioned in 1977 and is located in Troyes, a small medieval town in France. It started to be designed through a close collaboration between architect and client, but the building permit was denied by the local council, which therefore meant that the project had to change if they wanted the local council to allow them to start building. Precisely at that time there was a new feeling among French architects, the aim of trying to reach a greater freedom in the architectural discipline, and Nouvel became deeply committed to these ideas.

It is possible to say that these incompatibility issues between the government and architects are still occurring today and they even tend to create a lot of controversy when the architects want to build in sensitive places like this. The attitude of the architect was a great influence when they dared to solve the problem with the administration, taking a critical view when he had to modify the design of the facade due to outdated regulations and conservative minds.

There are few occasions when we can clearly see the mark of censorship on a building, and Dick's house is one of them. The scars of red bricks over the facade are testiment to this.

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Stories of houses                                                Esther Moreno Romero de Ávila

HOUSE IN A PLUM GROVE by Kazuyo Sejima

The house, was designed by the architect Kazuyo Sejuma for a family that wanted to have more than a house in its classic meaning. Indeed, they were looking for a place made to allow reflection and that could be a shelter of each member’s mind.

The house, characterized by its extreme plainness, has a shape of a small white prism. There are three floors and the layout is trapezoidal. The interior of the house is divided into seventeen small rooms, of which each one serves just one function. The rooms are connected to one another through big holes in their walls.

I chose this house because I think that the organization of the interior space is very interesting. The Architect  played with the limits of the different spaces in order to reach the privacy that people usually need, but, at the same time, to give them freedom of movement. Also, it is remarkable the level of communication’s fluency reached between interior and exterior spaces. Depending on our position in the house and the hole of the wall that we are looking at, the space that surrounds us, as well as the situation that is taking place in that very moment vary significantly.  

What sensations would we feel living in a house like this one? Myself, without having been there, have the sensation that I would be sometimes a bit overwhelmed due to the small sizes of the rooms. However, this oppression would get better when I looked at those holes  which allow us to contemplate the wide plum garden.

FRANK GEHRY’S HOUSE IN CALIFORNIA.

The Frank Gehry’s house is a small house that has undergone changes and expanded throughout time because of the combination of different parts of basic materials. This, makes the house look unfinished.

Through the constant changes, the architect designed the house as a masterpiece, similar to a collage. Moreover, he did all that bearing in mind that the basic function of the house is to allow people to live in it.

 I chose this house because I believe it to be very interesting due to the project progress according to the needs of the family that lives in the house. Also, I was impressed by the success reached by the project, which does not have a nice design at first sight.

The story of this house, makes us aware that big amounts of money or materials are not essential for the realization of a valid project. Moreover, a house with a great external look doesn’t always give you the comfort you wish.

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Cristina Carpintero López

The Stretto House in Dallas, Steven Holl

    The complexity that the architect has given the building is one of the qualities that favour it, as not all are free to devise a home without any conditions.

    The hardest thing in these cases is to get the first idea why I think that the recognition of what is going to surround the building is a good starting point, a fact that cause to the connection to the music and housing, showing that whit a simple murmur of water can we imagine the beginning of what will become a house. For that reason I find interesting the union of something as different as are the architecture and music and how Steven Holl makes this union a construction that is based on two main ideas of this project: the water and Stretto.

     Referring to this musical movement Holl's connects the different rooms that make up the house, as well as the materials that form, fusing each with the following. Also we can see this concept whit the interior and the exterior of the house, because architecture isn't only edifications, architecture is the fusion of the house whit this environment.

     Finally, the most striking aspect of this project is overlapping planes, just as the need to make use of the five senses to appreciate it in all its essence.

House in Lège (Anne Lacaton and Jean Philippe Vassal)

      This house, as a holiday destination, belonging to a brother and sister who used to visit this area in ours infancy. My interest in this building comes to see how to tackle the problem because they had one terrain very difficult from building a home. The brothers were know that they didn't want to contribute to the transformation of the landscape around them, as they had done their neighbors, so one of the requirements was to respect nature that lay there, so the architects were forced to enter in housing.

     The idea of ​​using these trees as pillars of the house I found it very appealing, along with how to avoid damage to the structure caused by moving them to the blowing wind. Furthermore, the fact of raising the structure to avoid damaging the dunes and create a new space under the house is also a strong point, as well as the intention of the architects when using plates of corrugated aluminum that symbolize an artificial sky for the reflection of the sea.

      Finally the most outstanding idea of the this project and the most striking is the fusion of architecture with the environment to fit the building to nature and know that this is possible.

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Murat Çokçeken
The U-House / Toyo Ito
Maison a Bordeaux / Rem Koolhaas

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Maison a Bordeaux,  Rem Koolhaas

Michael Palmisciano

One of the most interesting houses is certainly Rem Koolhaas ‘s ‘Maison a Bordeaux’.   I think that it is the one that can best describe the characteristics and needs of it’s owner and better represents a true refuge for him. The architect, in addition to satisfying the customer’s requirements, succeeds in surprising him and exceeds expectations which I find to be extraordinary.

After the incident that forced the owner to a wheelchair, his life was changed deeply and for this reason his home becomes the only place where he can find comfort and release.

Among the most interesting architectural elements of this house clearly, the platform is the most essential for this customer.  What is surprising is the way in which it was designed. The architect was successful in not allowing it to represent this man’s burden as a simple lift or a metal ramp would have.  This platform disappears into the three levels, becoming a complement rather than a symbol of burden.  It completes the design of the house and it’s owner’s life.

Another extraordinary element is the instability that the architect resolves to create through similarities between the building and the life of the owner himself. In fact, as the balance of the house is guaranteed through a metallic wire, the same happens for the owner. Therefore, the connection is very strong and this is the true basis of architecture.

The same idea is applied to the middle floor which is surrounded by glass walls.  I believe this instills a great sense of freedom to a man who has unfortunately lost this to a tragic accident.

Casita para un Kolonihaven,  Enric Miralles

Michael Palmisciano

I find ‘la casita para un Kolonihaven’ by Enric Miralles and his wife Benedetta Tagliabue, to be very interesting. This small house in Denmark functions as protection for the owners from the external elements of cold and rain, etc., while allowing them to be immersed in nature. This architect is able to maintain tradition while adding the element of the passage of time.

As stated by the designers, the house was converted into a calendar.  The wonderful thing is to see the passage of time both inside and outside of the house. Internally we can see this as the adults sit around a table watching their children grow-up while externally the transformation takes place through nature and is marked by the flowers as described by the designers.

One of the most interesting and special things is the way in which the two have designed the plant, in fact it is born out of the movements of the chair that had been given to the child. This further emphasizes the concept behind this project , infantile movements make  the project grow, develop over time and become mature and real.

The presence of two different inputs and heights between the parts devoted to the child and to the adult , perfectly tell the story and focus on the theme for this project.  The forms, the interior and some of the significant elements used, tell us what the architect has in mind while designing.

Knowledge of the  desires and  feelings of both the customers and designers enables is to deeply understand an architectural project.

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Alfonso Melero Beviá

HOUSE IN LÈGE

The House in Lège is one of the houses which respects more the nature around itself I have ever seen.   As we can read in the story of the house, the dwellings which had already been built on that place had completely destroyed the environment before start building the house, that was not the case of Anne Lacaton and Jean Philippe vassal’s house. In my opinion, architecture has to be adapted to the environment, however it use to be on the contrary. What people usually make is “cleaning” the place where the dwelling is going to be for having the house they want just like they want. So I think is fantastic to find people who want to coexist with the place and the nature, who do not worry about if the house is so pretty as they expect, because the really important for them is not that, what they really want is living with the nature, not running away from it. I am sure living in this kind of house is much nicer tan living in a big mansion without any sample of nature.

HOUSE IN RIVA SAN VITALE

The House in Riva San Vitale is, in my opinion, a clear example of functionality. To start with, we find a gangway which drives the visitors to the house. This gangway has been built for not placing the house beside the cliff getting this way a bigger rank of views for the house. Then the windows are located in certain places which have been studied before getting the desired view. So it is not important how the dwelling looks on the outside, because the really important is what you see when you are in the house. What do you want a pretty house on the outside for if then you cannot enjoy it on the inside? I think this is the philosophy that Mario Botta used for projecting this house. However, not everybody thinks like that and popularly people prefer living in useless beautiful houses.

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Re-reading Stories of Houses

Chris Wilson

The Gagalun House by Peter Zumthor

Peter Zumthor has an admirable and unique approach to his design work, his success as an architect, both on small-scale single dwelling like this house to large public buildings such as the Therme Vals, is evidence that his work is well worth taking note of. The respect for the existing structure, its historical background, and the surrounding landscape in which it is placed, is very important when taking on a project such as this.

The house had been handed down through generations and the architect’s admiration for this played a strong part in the design process. Minimal intervention to the exterior and internal elements of the old house, and the extension that will, in time, blend in with the existing one, shows the architects intentions are to make a lasting impact on the house, in hope that it will last as long as the original building has. He researched and understands the materials that he used and the long-term appearance of the building was clearly in his mind throughout the design process.

Zumthor’s experience as a cabinetmaker aided him in designing the timber structure, which is an example of how you can use your practical knowledge and understanding and apply it to your architecture.

Can Lis and Can Feliz in Mallorca by Jørn Utzon

Jørn Utzon employs a number of important elements in the design for both of these houses. The response to site, and conditions of the site are critical. Can Lis has been designed to react to the sun’s movement, baring in mind the internal function of each of the structures, or, pavilions. Arranging the group of buildings so that each of them faces a different orientation not only gives them all a unique view, but shows a clear understanding that different rooms within a house require different conditions at different times of day. For example, you do not want to have bedrooms facing west so that the sun is shining into them in the evenings, when the inhabitants may be trying to sleep.

Integration of the building into the landscape so that it does not have a harsh impact on the environment was also a key factor for the architect. Using local stone helped achieve this subtle blend of residence and landscape, with the house complimenting the scene, rather than standing out for negative reasons.

The window treatment used on the house also plays a strong role on the internal atmosphere. The frames on the outside of the window openings allow an uninterrupted view between internal space and the stunning landscape. This brings a stronger connection between the internal spaces and it’s surrounding context.

The idea of the house being so closely connected with this specific site, raises the concept that architecture can be used to improve the connection between nature and the inhabitants mind. Producing a form of escape, freedom, and personal utopia.

Giuseppe Massacci

VILLA ANBAR, PETER BARBER

I found the Peter Barber’s  Villa Anbar a  very interesting project.

Made in Dammam, in Saudi Arabia, where the architecture are conditioned by political and religious ideologies, where institutions pose barriers between the sexes: male and female.  Barber must convert his architectural knowledge and adapt to an environment alien to him.

The architect in this work, apparently made ​​according to the local traditional style, reflect  inside and outside of the house  a deep sense of hierarchy between men and women, through a game of looks and hierarchies architectural  tries to put one social gash status of Muslim women and to induce change, encourage equality of rights between men and women.

Question which I am very sensitive is the  problem that afflicts the humanity and should be subjected to bring knowledge  through campaigns cultural awareness, around the world and making sure that in the twenty-first century does not speak more than a difference in treatment between men and women.

CASITA PARA UN KOLONIHAVEN, ENRIC MIRALLES

Enric Miralles, in collaboration with his wife Benedetta Tagliabue, he created a small garden shed to spend leisure with wing nature, respecting the Danish traditions.

This project was designed as a temple "the house is converted into calendar" which expresses the passage of time and life.

A cottage made ​​for protect rain where children play and have fun while their parents sit around a table.  All this made ​​according to the same principle, in fact there are two entrances, one for adults  and one  in miniature for children, is also composed of different heights: low starting from the children side up to the highest for adults.

The thing that gets me about this project is the derivation of the shape of the plant, where the architect imitates the movements of her daughter realizes, as a design on the floor, playing with a small chair.

What  fascinates me of Miralles and his works is the way he involved his whole life in his work and it is what succeed in this project, to merge into a single architecture and small adult life with the child's life.

Inés Martínez Diez

House in Lège, by Anne Lacaton and Jean Philippe Vassal

I has chosen this house because I think that it’s really interesting how it connect with the plot of land, the way architects have respected all trees and the dune, how they have integrated some trees simulating that are pillars of the house in a symbolic way.

Moreover, can not be forgotten that the final solution of the house is fantastic. Especially if we consider the siblings’ conditions like don’t modify the land, having any view over the bay and, of course, a practical house.

In my opinion we have to learn the main idea of this house or of this story. Architects and clients don’t have to destroy the environment to build our houses, our workplaces, or our dreams. Instead of this we should take thi house as an example and we should try to make it real.

House in Pembromkeshire (Wales), by Future Systems

This story talks about a natural site which hasn’t been degraded, where you only can see the nature dotted with a few little houses. Here is where a politician and a millionaire man wanted to change his old timber army barrack to a modern house which doesn’t deteriorate the land. Most of the people may think that it can be possible, but it was.

I think the most interesting point of this story is the architects concern about don’t damage the landscape and the natural environment.. For example prefabricating the house in small units which were easy to take into the house with standard trucks (instead of big trucks that could not approach the site), or also making the house half buried to hide it into the mountains.

There is another idea that I believe it’s important in the next:

Many times law can limit us in our projects, and sometimes the can get to cancel the project.
But I would like to emphasize the architects’ effort to enforce laws and achieving an exceptional solution.