[In]Exterior, Falahatian Yard-House / [SHIFT] Process Practice

Curated by ArchDaily

Architects: [SHIFT] Process Practice
Area: 677 m²
Year: 2016
Manufacturers: Namachin Esfahan
Structural Consultant: Sarvin Structural Consultants, Pedram Mosahebi Mohammadi
Construction Manager: Pouria Shafiee

[In]Exterior, Falahatian Yard-House / [SHIFT] Process Practice - Facade, Courtyard — © Parham Taghioff

[In]Exterior is an exercise in challenging the well-established conventions of designing for a second home or a retreat family house.

[In]Exterior, Falahatian Yard-House / [SHIFT] Process Practice - Facade, Handrail — © Parham Taghioff

Conventionally speaking, retreat homes are conceptualized as villas in the park with a focus on maximizing the visual access of the interiors to the surrounding natural vista through transparent exterior thresholds of a solid volume.

[In]Exterior, Falahatian Yard-House / [SHIFT] Process Practice - Windows, Facade — © Parham Taghioff

[In]Exterior is a family house located in a retreat village in the periphery of City of Isfahan. The suburban context of the project offers no substantial natural view or meaningful topographic variation. Hence, the spatial organization of the project is fundamentally transformed to introduce two connected semi-courtyards. Instead of looking outward at a non existing natural vista or impressive view, the project is shifting its visual focus to the inner yards, arriving at maximum transparency of the architectural thresholds where the interior spaces meet the interiorized yards.

The redefinition of inside/outside relation is also deriving the material condition of the architectural surfaces. The commonalities of surface material and texture, both in interior and exterior voids, allow for certain level of ambiguity in differentiating the interior and exterior condition from a perceptual point of view.

[In]Exterior, Falahatian Yard-House / [SHIFT] Process Practice - Windows, Beam — © Parham Taghioff

The spatial uncertainty in identifying the borderline between in and out is further established through the introduction of sliding walls that transforms the interior yards of the project to semi-open gardens.

Meanwhile, the introduction of the yards within the heart of the spatial organization of the house, allows for performative division of the house between the categorically different functions with private and public nature.

[In]Exterior, Falahatian Yard-House / [SHIFT] Process Practice - Image 6 of 30 — © Parham Taghioff

Product Description: For the facade of the building we decided to go for a white modular material to emphasize on the abstractness of the platonic forms of the project. Hence, the white industrially produced bricks of Namachin Esfahan were chosen.