PH El Salvador House

El Salvador, Buenos Aires, Argentina

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PH El Salvador House

El Salvador, Buenos Aires, Argentina

Firm

Type

Residential › Private House

YEAR

2008

SIZE

10,000 sqft - 25,000 sqft

From
the beginning of the project we understood the intrinsic qualities associated
with this piece of urban fabric. We
here deal with a rectangular space with measures that do not exceed 7.50 m x 12.00 m located practically
in the heart of the square. This
is a dwelling unit of the type of the row houses in the city of Buenos Aires. At the beginning of the last century
it was common to build small houses with the conceptual characteristics of the
“sausage house” multiplied for the depth of an urban lot. The project then rose as a challenge
to customer demands whose programmatic needs far exceeded the possibilities
offered by the nature of the terrain. We also had to be aware of the constraints
brought by the responsibility of reforming a historic site that was protected
by the law of the city of Buenos Aires.
The project had to meet the following customer demands:
"The house should have a lot of light"
"A large extended pool deck"
"Criteria for environmental protection"
"The house must comply with aesthetic criteria relating to the old house
PH"
"Low maintenance, due to its role as a hotel space"
Limited to four workstations divided by only four walls, and conditioned by the
small floor area, the premise of creating an interior courtyard became the alma mater of the project, following
which we organized the housing,
ordered the other spaces vertically upward reaching for air, light, and private
visual, finishing it off with a pool deck.
The decision on the choice and use of materials reflects the same search for
each space to place it in the courtyard, in a complete and honest way, creating
a glazed inner skin and a solid outer skin, resulting in either both its
materiality and its spatial
proportions and the idea of a pavilion floor, rather than a traditional
house.

Taken to the extreme, the intention was one of generating an ethereal skin-core
into the courtyard of the house, and searching for a structural, tectonic and
construction that would lead us to the idea of "disappearing" the
structure and thus achieve a certain voltage determined by weightlessness based on the idea of
a "floating pool" over living spaces. This idea was decisive along with that
of the use of a mixed structure, with iron columns to continue the centerline
of the woodwork, which is clearly opposed to the concrete volumes of marked
visual presence.
The search for constructive thinking, of an architecture of noble materials, and of the use of reinforced concrete, iron
and glass panels, was complemented by the decision to use refractory bricks as
the sole material for partitions, in view of achieving the desired aesthetic
and insulation conditions. In
turn we also reused elements of the pre-existing dwelling unit which refers us
to the original spirit of the property, which combined with the proposed
contemporary design, constitute an added value to the project.
Regarding
the links between elements, it is also interesting to look at this house. Since
the refractory brick wall in the subtle touch on the existing wall (in line
with this concrete column that supports the pool) the subtlety of the smithy of
its columns in relation to the crystals, to frameless doors verticality to offer certain
environments, everything makes a set of simple but delicate analysis in its
composition.
The
project was always dominated by the constant search for natural light, but it
was a search which served to form the crystal clear idea of weightlessness
that the volume of concrete gave the space. This
element ends by sewing the project clearly always looking for a dynamic cut
prefixed to static symmetry structured plant.
The movement of the housing is closely related to the courtyard and its visual
crossing it vertically and spiraled from the PB, to 1P and finally to the roof. Both from the circulation and from
each room of the house can see the true essence of vernacular courtyard.
The visuals to the corridor are screened by a "cushion plant"
provided by planters, thanks to which provides more depth to the dividing wall
on a large scale.
The skylight gives the only light that is controlled, illuminating the brick
wall that frames the movement of the two levels.
The program is reversed to what is traditionally understood as private and
public space as a result of understanding the character of space to live during
both day and night, creating a provision that goes private in the ground floor
to the public on first floor, looking
for something tall, light and visual.
The ground floor contains two bedrooms en suite and a nearly symmetric entrance
hall whose functionality can also be an office / expansion into the courtyard,
which is the result of an interstitial space between the two functional suites.
The floor, which is certainly where public program seeks visual light and the
sky from his room and kitchen / dining room, are both connected by a bridge. The tour ends after crossing the outer
circulation that connects the first terrace on a slope with respect to the
second.
This is a house that offers certain complexity in court, not in facility, which
maintains an orderly and symmetrical linear program. In plant there are replicate
circulation spaces on both levels, below the level of the pool. The remaining two wings at both levels
are in substantially equal proportions.
In court we verify the range of heights by proposing a dynamic of continuous and
staggered run. The limitation of
the size of the yard was the reason for the levels of the different terraces. The development of the stairs to the
terrace should respond to consistent proportions and dimensions, thus indirectly
allowing for a dynamic height in both environments while differentiating the
uses on both terraces. Also noteworthy is a differentiation in the flooring,
which verifies the diversity of activities in relation to the use of the
terraces, one in relation to activities link with the interior of the house and
another as a solarium in direct contact with the pool.
The equipping the house was designed with the understanding that it should only
meet the minimum needs to respond to the existing current hotel demands in Buenos Aires. Beds,
phones that allow for various provisions, little furniture and simple lines.
All the furniture was made of wood.
To meet the criteria of a sustainable house, considering that the heat loss of
the crystals is a real demand for the need for light, it was decided to use DVH
in virtually all mobile cloths. The
fittings were performed with equipment multisplit VRV (Variable refrigerant
volume) which allows control of electricity consumption. The dual flush system on
the toilet is to save water consumption.
All facilities are electric, with gas left only for the use of pool heating.
Technically the pool was resolved with a system called "Liner" whose
conditions should avoid the full potential of water filtration, whereas below
this are the dining and livings room of the house.
The pool must also meet minimum standards of maintenance by using automated
cleaning systems imported from Europe.
The recurring question of a practitioner before the intervention of an existing
work is generally how to get this link between the past and present. Here we have encountered this dilemma,
which should clearly take account of collective tissue in the case of row
houses, and a strong footprint of the existing PH house. While understanding
the fabric of a row house in a chaotic succession of spaces within the
complexity that lies in them today, we limited ourselves to only keep the line
of the existing wall height, molding it as defined by a single factor to bind
it to the whole. We decided to
keep the original layout of the house respecting the original footprint and
almost the same proportions as the current intervention.
Elements such as access doors to the rooms, the flooring of brick, were details
reminiscent of the old home.
All these elements associated with the use of iron, glass and concrete in its
purest form, coupled with minimal intervention of the walls have established a
balance we have sought in the set.