It was a privilege indeed to design a new house for someone who grew up, many years ago, in the one we build for their parents, and actually building it was an authentic synergy. Sharing the adventure of combining individual skills with a developer, a builder, professionals and craftsmen and working towards a precise, surprising end product.
The plot is on the corner near the roads of Avenida Cala Gat and Calle Arcadia, and is surrounded by pine trees. It is almost square in shape and set higher up than the avenue itself, lending it a certain privacy and affording views of the nearby cove, behind the pine trees and towards the sea and Es Cap Vermell.
Taking advantage of the sloping Calle Arcadia, we situated the entrances at the upper level of the land, using the lower level for the platform of the ground floor, which complements the home itself, on the first floor.
Continuing with the local tradition thick stone masonry walls rise up from the piece of land, delimiting the property and spaces of the porous ground floor, linking it to the site. From the outside the tectonic wall system, which orders the garden, directs the approach and access to protect us inside, from where it protects outwards, blending into a continuum of architecture and landscape.
The abstract spaces resulting from the programme requested respond to their surroundings, from which they are protected or exposed and selectively recede in accordance with time, the seasons, the climate… and the interest of those who inhabit them.
The shapes, colours, textures and proportions respond to the materialisation of the ideas we have on the atmosphere which should qualify the new home for this young family, here, in a natural, balanced and amiable fashion.
ENERGY EFFICIENCY. Like the best traditional architecture, which is sensitive to the environment, the project was developed in accordance with bioclimatic principles from the very beginning. Reconciling shape, material and energy with the local climate, we designed this new model, the fruit of the composition of architectural solutions, on the basis of the set of techniques and materials avaiable, seeking interior comfort through natural means and reducing consumption of non-renewable energy.
The shape of the property and its location are designed simultaneously as a response to ideas and for greater solar gain in winter, and to exploit sea breezes in summer. The window panes set back in the south façade prevent the vertical rays of sun of the summer from entering inside, whilst allowing access of more horizotal ones in winter.
Gaps have been distributed around façades and roof causing, directing and controlling natural lighting and ventilation of the interior and the views, reserving the integrated architectural artificial LED lighting for nighttime.
The construction itself, incredibly isolated by its exterior, contributes to the stability of the interior comfort, as well as enveloping, protecting and shaping the habitable spaces. Accumulating, by natural means, the thermal solar energy captured so as to conveniently cede it back when the sources have ceased to exist.
An integral system manages heating and cooling, hot running water and ventilation, generated by thermal solar energy by means of vacuum tubes installed on the roof, complemented by an efficient heat pump. This system is distributed via water piping, open to the future inclusion of renewable energies, to the hot water service points – taps, underfloor heating and/or fan coil heating, for cooling also, in conjunction with the heat pump.
The tecnological elements are arranged inside protective casings, archittecturally sized to satisfy physical, psychological and aesthetical functions, a link between past, present and future.