ARX

This is our second project for the Aroeira golf development. The plot is long and narrow, slightly triangular, with a gentle slope running along its length. Densely wooded with tall pine trees, it opens up abruptly to the north, where it borders the golf course.

The house takes shape as three continuous volumes, articulated around two patios. The first volume runs lengthwise at the entrance; single-storey, it houses the garage and service areas. The second is transverse and contains the shared life of the house: the kitchen and living rooms, stacked over two floors, which open onto the landscape.

The last volume is again longitudinal, single-storey (suspended), and holds the bedroom wing. Both patios are clad in white handmade tiles; the first, double-height, extends the atmosphere of the living room through a reflecting pool.

The design of the house focused on its relationship with the topography and the distant landscape, and it therefore takes on a serpentine form that "slides" down the slope, leaning now against one long boundary, now against the other, to ensure privacy. As the natural ground descends, the roof rises, and the house shifts from resting on the ground to a levitating condition, raised on slender steel columns that mark a path from the garden to the swimming pool.