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Architects: Grizzo Studio
- Area: 450 m²
- Year: 2022
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Photographs:Federico Kulekdjian
Text description provided by the architects. This project crosses us from two perspectives, on one hand, the identity of the neighborhood where we were born and at the same time the identity of the house where we were raised, whose architect was our mother, although the sentimental value was immense, it did not prevent us from taking advantage of it to, from the connection of the original with new morphologies, materiality experiments and the combination of different construction systems, contribute to the desired architecture that characterizes us, and that would also become the presentation card of our studio.
For the renovation of the facade, it was decided to intervene to a greater extent in the openings, as they consisted of small wooden windows with divided glass. In this way, we were able to expand the openings, allowing more light to enter the new spaces and reducing future maintenance by replacing the wood with black aluminum.
We took advantage of the original structure of the bow windows and replaced them with black metal boxes that are embedded in both the exposed brick facade and the original roof, leaving the original brick moldings to further highlight this coexistence of the old with the new.
The new building functions just like any other, with an entrance hall that pays homage to the transformation and recycling of the project, featuring a bench made from the leftover tiles from the intervened roof areas.
The existing structure was also opened up to accommodate an elevator, and the original stairs of the house were used as the current staircase core of the building. The chosen color palette for all the new elements was dark, allowing the original materials of the house, the exposed brick, and the tiles, to always stand out on the facade and in the common areas.
The same color palette was adopted for the architecture studio located on the first floor, as through its windows that open to the street, its interior becomes part of the facade, especially the illuminated curved brick ceiling that covers the entire studio. This achieves unity and character in a small space divided by work tables and filled with shelves with samples and models. The rest of the elements, such as marble tables, wall coverings, and metal shelves, also stand out due to the dark palette, subtle curves, and rustic materials resulting from the studio's experiments in each new project.
On the ground floor, the two-story apartment house chose a light palette, with white and wood. The challenge was to gather in 200 m2 all the spaces that the previous owners of the 450 m2 house were used to, so the ground floor is developed as a large open space with a living room, dining room, and kitchen, separated from the garden and exterior gallery by a 7-meter-long window that hides in the side walls so that when opened, the interior integrates completely with the exterior of the house. On the second floor, there are 3 bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a terrace.
On the second floor, there is a dental clinic with a reception area, waiting room, 3 consultation rooms, and a laboratory. Each room has natural light and ventilation that reflect the chosen color palette and materiality of white and gray.
On the third and last floor, we took advantage of the original attic of the house to design an apartment where, despite its only 70m2, situations of a house can be experienced, both through its large exterior expansions and its interior spatiality of a modern cabin where the kitchen, living room, and dining room are organized around the original fireplace of the house under the double-height wooden ceiling.
For all this, the tile roofs were opened in two areas that, in addition to providing cross ventilation to the apartment, resulted in a front terrace balcony and a terrace with a grill at the back. To avoid occupying the original double height, we added a mezzanine above the staircase core of the building, where we located the loft-style integrated bedroom that overlooks the living room.
