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Beyond viewing the home as mere shelter and protection, there is now a much greater complexity of functions integrated into the elementary programs of dwelling. We no longer think only of spaces for sleeping, cooking, and bathing, but rather of a series of new programs that demand new spaces and configurations. Among these, leisure emerges as an activity integrated into living, in the form of backyards, swimming pools, and TV rooms. 

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Residential swimming pools have become a staple in housing developments and private homes, particularly in regions where warm weather prevails for most of the year. Sun, shade, and cool water call for a landscape design that fosters harmony in these spaces.

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Every year, our curatorial team presents a retrospective of house projects that stood out over the period. This collection, a small selection of the more than two thousand projects published on ArchDaily Brasil this year alone, comprises a series of residences with specific design solutions that address, each in their own way, factors such as materials, construction techniques, structural systems, building processes, and programs.

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In Six Memos for the Next Millennium, Italo Calvino explores lightness from a literary perspective and argues, "Opposed to lightness is weight. Removing weight produces lightness; it is a value, not a defect." Drawing on Greek mythology, he reflects on one of Perseus's feats after severing the head of the terrible Gorgon Medusa without being turned to stone. Assisted by the gods Hades, Hermes, and Athena, Perseus flies with his winged sandals and uses a bronze shield as a mirror to reflect her image. Relying, like many architects, on what is lightest—the wind and the clouds—he also fixes his gaze on what is revealed through indirect vision: an image reflected in a mirror.

Historically, transparency has been naturalized as an inherent condition of modern architecture. With the shift from the heavy load-bearing wall to the lightweight glass envelope, glass was introduced into the discipline, blurring the boundaries between interior and exterior spaces. In connection with inflatable architecture, transparency is linked to lightness and impermanence, leaving temporary traces on the landscapes it inhabits. By using textiles or plastics as main materials and air as a structural system, the search for lightness in the built environment now recognizes more than a single atmosphere of application.

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Across Latin America, renovation has become less about preservation alone and more about responding to changing ways of living. Rather than freezing buildings in time, many contemporary projects work with existing structures to adapt them to new domestic routines, social dynamics, and spatial needs. Through strategic changes in materials, composition, color, and light, these interventions reinterpret everyday spaces while maintaining a strong connection to their original context.

In this process, houses and apartments become sites of transformation where flow, continuity, and shared spaces are carefully reconsidered. Renovation operates as a precise architectural tool, one that prioritizes natural light, openness, and flexibility to support daily life as it evolves. Instead of imposing new forms, these projects repurpose what is already there, aligning spatial decisions with the habits and rituals of those who inhabit them.

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