1 Comment »

Wood Houses the Families of Three Sisters in the Spanish Countryside

• Tweet

• Tweet

The firm of Blancafort-Reus Arquitectura has designed an unusual house to be shared by three sisters, and their families, in Spain.

The house is most unusual for Spain, because it is an all wooden structure, entirely clad in pressure treated pine.

The plan is unusual too: three narrow wings spread outwards. These allow for the maximum cross ventilation to protect the temperature inside.

That winged plan also allows each family to have privacy and their own unique views outward.

But intimate connections are easily made between each family’s space.

Cooling strategies were employed in the siting and shading to adapt the architecture to the baking hot climate, while allowing the sun in in winter.

On the sides oriented to the cool north light,  the windows are larger.

Floors are cool polished concrete.  Cross ventilation and insulated glass keep the interiors cool.

Rainwater is captured and stored to water the trees and the vegetable garden.

The heat of the sun is used to heat water in solar thermal panels set out of sight on the highest parts of the three buildings.

The hottest south-facing sides have few openings to allow heat in.

The finished result, looking like an outcropping of farm buildings, merges well in the surrounding agricultural landscape, in a hot and dry region of Spain known for olive groves and grapevines.