A family's Puerto Escondido home on a sandy beach nods to monasteries and haciendas
Casa Copycha by Anonimous in Mexico's Puerto Escondido sandy coast is a holiday home that draws on local, traditional typologies and brings them to the 21st century
A new build Puerto Escondido home, Casa Copycha on the sandy shores of West Mexico, is a private residence that takes its cues as much from modern needs and aesthetics, as it does from the region's vernacular - and in particular monasteries and Mexican haciendas. Designed by Querétaro- and Mexico City-based studio Anonimous, the house stands out for its sensitive yet eye-catching architecture, which takes in its context and invites its users to commune with the area's coastal environment.
Step inside Puerto Escondido home Casa Copycha
The Puerto Escondido home is located a stone's throw from the local airport, and is located in a chunk of land dedicated to residential use. As a result, the design was conceived to embrace the area's serene atmosphere and connection with the Mexican West Coast's omnipresent, rich nature.
Casa Copycha sought to satisfy its owners' desire for 'a more private life for rest and pause, and a profound interaction between the interior and exterior: leaving one space, walking through the portico, and encountering the vegetation, the sun, the air, and the summer rain,' the architects explain.
The home's central courtyard nods to local traditional building typologies but is not a gesture of nostalgia - this open space becomes key to not only the circulation within the home, connecting spaces and emphasising a flow between indoors and outdoors. It also helps navigate the terrain's topography. Designed to be slightly sunken, the house's open air core helps users effortlessly move from the entrance to the main family spaces beyond.
An exposed concrete base helps anchor the home to the ground, morphing into a gateway and a solid foundation for living. Further up, a Mexican palapa (a type of thatched roof made of dried palm leaves), 20m long and 12m wide, is made using a parota wood structure and local palm, nodding to local building techniques and crafts.
Inside, the main living spaces, alongside the outdoor decks and swimming pool, are orientated towards the sea. The sense of hearing was central to the design, the architects emphasise, as they wanted the users to be able to listen to the waves throughout daily life - a background natural soundscape to accompany the family's routines.
Bedrooms and private areas are placed on the upper level of this two-storey structure. Large openings still keep the residents at close contact with their environment at every turn.
What guided the architects in their concept? 'The strategies of opposites - between closing and opening, heaviness and lightness, movement and pause - create a profound connection with the place, its intense light, its heavy rains, and the powerful sound of the waves of this place on the Mexican Pacific,' they say.
