Playa Guiones, in the town of Nosara, Costa Rica has long been known by the wider international community of surfers as a hidden gem and off-grid paradise of white sand beaches and constant waves. Decades ago the first wooden house in town was built close to the beach-break and in time this simple structure became the perfect resting place for transient surfers as well as a gathering venue for music, food, and interaction. The Gilded Iguana was born!
Today Nosara still attracts avid surfers from around the world however it has also become a destination for yogis, the wellness community, and families looking for healthy fun and adventure. Everyone shares a common goal to preserve the natural habitat and the low-key unpretentious essence of the place.
Stepping down a steep hillside and overlooking the ocean, Mint Santa Theresa is a new hotel that blends a European design aesthetic with Costa Rican craftsmanship – created to ensure that guests can commune with nature, each other and local people.
The Swedish owners fell in love with Santa Theresa as a surfing paradise, as well as its burgeoning yoga community. Inspired by Greek architecture, minimalism and Scandinavian design, they commissioned Studio Saxe who have developed a reputation for their approach to architecture that harmonises with tropical landscapes.
VOID. As an office we have a strong conviction that every project we develop, be it private or public development, should be thought to impact its imediate local context in a greater way.
Contenedores Franceschi is a project born from the heart of a family that loves nature and is concerned about the environment, following that natural cycle of growing, they see the need to increase the space in which they live so that everyone has their independence and privacy but still stay together, they decide to build three apartments, in the property where they built their house and live about 20 years ago, a terrain adjacent to the canyon of the Uruca River, in Santa Ana, west of San José, Costa Rica.
The premise was to create 3 independent units, low impact with the environment, which respects the privacy of the existing house, adapting to the available budget.
Located in a rural area in the outskirts of San Jose, is [El Establo]. A project that was thought to have a very honest relationship with both its natural and constructed context. The concept of the project stems from the structures for the stables, very common in the area that regularly has horse’s establishments.
A relatively warm zone throughout the year motivated us to implement climate conditioning strategies such as long overhangs and cross ventilation, typical of tropical architecture. The area, although it is 20 km from San Jose, has conditions closer to the dry tropical forest.
Other participants: Arq. Carlos A. Bolaños A., Arq. Daniela M. Chaverri C., Arq. Ana Rosa Alan, Arq. Andrey Blanco, Arq. Cesar Delgado, S3 Ingenieros, Ing. Jose A. Murillo.
Gross Built Area (square meters or square foot): 126,38 m2
Set in the rainforest of Santa Teresa, Costa Rica, two modern homes project out of the landscape and are defined by a series of steel frames that that bring the best modern methods of construction to a tropical location. The use of large steel I-beams and concrete is a tenet of the international language of Modernist architecture and Studio Saxe have taken this design approach and recontextualised it for contemporary use. This project is a continuation of their search for an authentic Central American tropical architecture.
Studio Saxe has completed a boutique hotel and yoga studio set into in tropical landscape of Nosara, Costa Rica. The project is another in a long line of sustainable buildings from the practice that blend contemporary design with local craftsmanship, embracing the natural environment that surrounds and frames the architecture.
In the Papagayo peninsula, placed on the tip of an seaward pointing, and slightly downward sloping ridge of a peninsular shaped lot, with forest on both sides (one a natural reserve), is the house named Indios Desnudos.
It is named after some of the most characteristic trees on the lot, indio desnudo (naked indian) they make up a focal point of the house, especially in the main living area.
To inhabit a house is to use each of its spaces, not only according to its specific purpose, that is to say, a kitchen will not be used only for cooking, a room will not only be for sleeping, a hallway will not be a linear path. Experiencing a home like Murray Music includes exploration, giving another meaning and other use to spaces that normally have specific functions.
Murray Music House is designed for a family of 5 inhabitants, mom, dad and three children, who constantly feedback the design process, being this key for the definition of each space and each corner of the house.
The fast-growing Employee Solidarity Association of the National Bank of Costa Rica was in need of a new headquarter. They envisioned not only to build their house, but to create a common roof to shelter institutions with shared values and synergies.
The building is located in Llorente de Tibás, a mixed and varied urban fabric that changes dramatically both in landscape and program on every side of the irregular plot. The east facade faces a National Highway, the northern one faces a commercial street and the south side of the plot borders a sprawled residential community. The building accordingly responds differently to every side, situation that is intensified by the bioclimatic parameters that requested the maximum light from the north and south and thermal reductions from the strong east and west lights. This is contrary to the plot geometry that has the shortest side to the north and a reason why the concrete louvers were proposed as a project feature.
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