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Architects: Taguá Arquitetura
- Area: 350 m²
- Year: 2021
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Photographs:Leonardo Giantomasi
Text description provided by the architects. Located in a residential condominium in the interior of São Paulo, in the city of Cabreúva, Casa MP has 350 m² of built area, with a construction system in soil-cement/ecological brick with some elements in exposed concrete and steel. It is an ecologically correct and intelligent construction, taking the best of the characteristics that this type of material can offer.
The concept that guided the design of this house was the use of ecologically correct materials and architecture with a brutalist and industrial style. Our decision was to use ecological brick as the main structural and aesthetic element of the house.
Added to it, we used exposed concrete, present on the floor of the whole house, on the exposed panel slab, and on the blind gable which, in addition to being a structural element - behaving like a large pillar - serves as a piece of furniture for the television, a metallic structure - present on the roof gourmet, and wood for the porch lining. On the external floor, we use ceramics and fulget around the pool.
The house is arranged in two prismatic volumes - one contains the bedrooms - 5 suites - and the other social area and services. To contrast this more rustic atmosphere, the straighter and more modernist design of the house provided the balance we needed: a modern, contemporary house, but using rustic elements, in their raw/natural state.
The customers' idea was to let go of many finishing materials - we eliminated plastering, painting, and the coverings remained only on the front of the kitchen and bathrooms. “less is more” was the main idea, joining the ecologically correct concept of the residence.
The house also has a cistern to reuse the water captured on the roof for taps in the garden and outside. Includes photovoltaic energy. As the house is for weekends, the idea was also to design a residence that would provide little maintenance to the residents.
Spatiality. The plot located in a cul-de-sac, with a curved frontage, defined the layout of the residence in two volumes, one in the longitudinal direction and the other in the transversal direction, both joined by a third volume that defines the main access to the residence and distributes the flows. The longitudinal volume shelters the intimate wing and the transversal volume contemplates the social area, leisure, garage, and services.
The whole construction is composed only of bricks, wood, exposed concrete, and steel, bringing a raw aspect and contributing to the materiality of the architecture. As with all the elements of the residence, the polished concrete floor and exposed panel slab follow a more brutalist language, creating unity in the whole.
Spatial and visual integration. Another important point of the MP Residence concept is its spatial and visual integration. The living room is connected to the gourmet area through a large glass panel that provides integration between the interior and exterior, allowing a total view of the pool and garden. When these doors are opened, the whole social environment is integrated, forming a large meeting space, with a living room, kitchen, dining room, and terrace. In the living room, a blind exposed concrete gable separates the entrance hall that distributes the flow of the residence and the living room itself, and also serves as a piece of furniture for the TV. The gourmet veranda has a steel roof lined with mixed wood lining, being used as a counterpoint to the apparent panel slab present throughout the internal space.
The facade of the residence has small vertical openings, from floor to ceiling, contributing to the privacy of the residents and also blocking and filtering sunlight, which enters the environment, forming a beautiful play of lights. On the facade, keeping the bricks, the painting in black brought depth, and an even more industrial atmosphere, which was one of the requests of the clients for this project. The raw steel door, with the hatch handle, was also a customer request, bringing a more industrial face to the project, which matches their personality.
Soil-cement brick, concrete, and steel. The use of soil-cement bricks contributed to more sustainable construction since the material is produced without the need to burn in a kiln and therefore its production does not release gasses into the atmosphere. Allied with this factor, the material in question has a high thermo-acoustic performance, in addition to there being no need to use mortar for laying, being replaced by a special glue. We have a reduction of at least 5 degrees Celsius in relation to the external environment, as the heat exchange is carried out through the internal holes of the bricks.
Another important factor was the drastic reduction of debris at the site. As we use most of the prefabricated materials - slab, the brick itself which eliminated the need for plastering, steel roofing, in 16 months of work only 5 dumpsters were removed from the build, which for a house of this size is very little! Waste of materials was reduced by at least 40%, thus positively impacting the build time, cost, and sustainability of the project as a whole.
In this way, we wanted to demonstrate that it is possible to have a modern and contemporary home, respecting and helping nature with the use of more sustainable materials, generating fewer impacts, and thinking in the long term.
The more we think about construction techniques that generate less impact on the environment and that are more prefabricated, the more we evolve the construction system in the country as a whole and we collaborate with the maintenance of the environment, thinking about the disposal of this construction debris, which generates disorders and needs to be rethought more and more.
