Architecture
House RR, São Paulo
Architecture
The summer house provides ample opportunity for architectural experimentation, with a casual, relaxed atmosphere that precludes conventional spaces. The semi-tropical climate of Itamambuca in São Paulo state provided Andrade Morettin Arquitetos with a challenging site; with intense humidity, hot sun and heavy rain and what the architects describe as ‘exuberant vegetation’ to contend with, even though the plot was just a few metres from the beach.
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The solution was simplicity itself, as the architects enclosed their clients’ living spaces within a lightweight ‘shell’, a timber framed structure raised up on concrete pillars and clad in a combination of insulated steel panels and an ingenious system of sliding glass fibre mosquito screens.
The owners can therefore relax, surrounded by a permeable, transparent membrane that allows sea breezes into the core of this high-tech cave without also inviting the region’s endless supply of invertebrates.
Within this slender enclosure sits another structure, two storeys of timber boxes housing the kitchen and dining area, along with bathrooms and a bedroom on the lower level and two further bedrooms, each with its own private deck area, up above. A combination of full-height wooden and glass opening screens allow these compartments to become part of the main double-height living area, six metres high, which in turn can be opened up to the outside world.
The quasi-industrial feel of the generous 220-square metre house is offset by the towering wall of greenery that surrounds it, and the inside-outside feel of a platform in the jungle is enhanced by the hammocks hung casually on the wooden frame. Pre-fabrication kept costs down and speeded up construction and means the entire structure sits lightly on its idyllic site.
House RR was completed late last summer.
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