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Architects: cmDesign Atelier
- Area: 9687 ft²
- Year: 2019
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Photographs: Medina Dugger
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Manufacturers: Cimsa Turkey, Artscapes Constructioneering Works, Dura Composite, WNM limited, Nigalex Nigeria, Planen Ingegneria, Italy, Q-railng Nigeria
Text description provided by the architects. cmDesign Atelier has completed a 3-bedroom beach house in Ilashe, Lagos Nigeria. Lagos is known as the most populous city in Africa with challenges particularly in traffic management. Lagos is less publicly known for its serene beach environment, which in the last twenty years has become prime location for private beach houses. With the only access to the region via water travel, the beaches along the western peninsular have remained exclusive with limited urban development ensuring they retains it’s natural setting.
The aesthetic of the house is minimalist with an emphasis on neutrality to fully reflect and celebrate the beach surrounds. To soften and appreciate the plainer-nature of the architecture, we design a series rose-gold powder-coated 4mm-thick steel screens based on indigenous Yoruba ‘Adire’ fabric patterns to create a delicate contradiction but functionally to reduce the sun’s glare and act as privacy screens.
Our architectural intent was to create a series of spaces that could work for multiple gathering niches and more communal spaces for entertaining. The pool, 21meters long plays a focal role, reflecting beau- tifully the colour of the sky. Majority of the building materials were locally sourced, particularly the cedar wood for the tongue and groove doors and rotating shutter panels for the hot tub area. White concrete was used for the pool deck to avoid the monotony of a tiled surface and polished concrete was used for all internal spaces. Frame-less glass was used for the balustrade behind the steel laser cut screens to emphasis the elegance of the screens.
