serra del rei · rehabilitation project

Rehabilitating a representative building of our Popular Architecture with controlled costs, legitimizes a respectful rehabilitation. An idea that makes the building profitable without depriving it of its character. The idea for this house is to incorporate an old walled patio whose roof already exists. The house functionally changes from an L to a square. It is intended that the house is strongly related to the patio, i.e., the kitchen and the new living room are oriented to the patio, the old reception room becomes an office or a possible bedroom.

The area that had four compartments in partition walls now concentrates a maximum of programmatic content and resolves all the circulation and vertical distribution. This area now has a sanitary installation, the possibility of having one or both compartments on the first floor, an access staircase to the two rooms on the first floor and a space above the sanitary installation to make the most of the available ceiling height. The bathroom takes advantage of the light and ventilation from the window overlooking the national road. The staircase intends to be minimal and to obtain from its volume a storage that even though small is vital to exist.

In the kitchen changes are made to the space in order to get more light; from the old oven door a window opens to the living room; the door to the living room will be a wooden frame with the largest possible glass and the old door to the neighbor is transformed into a window of artificial light. In the living room, the two new balcony windows, the new interior access door and the kitchen door determine the circulation axes and divide the room into two living spaces. The living room is the relationship space with the kitchen and with the patio, the interior space of choice in which the gable roof results from the formal maintenance of the walls that formed the old patio.

The patio is a space prepared to make the most of the vegetated land, and for that a pedestrian path starting at the entrance next to the parking lot serves the house and ends at the annex. The path divides the arable land in two and can launch secondary paths to make the desired plantations profitable. The Well and the Stone Tank are recovered. An “island” in wooden decking is proposed, an outdoor seating area that allows the entire yard to be seen and maintains soil permeability.

The Annex is a longitudinal hybrid typology that can be enclosed and transformed into a small house with a living room, a kitchen counter and a bedroom/suite. It also has a storage/laundry room. The Project values rehabilitation, assumes the place and the originality of this heritage. The economy of means is rigorous, contention qualifies and structures the strategy of the architectural proposal.