Pillagua Barranco is a project of three detached houses located in the warm valley of Cumbaya, near Quito. The long terrain where the houses are located is characterized by a steep slope. The greatest potential of the land is precisely the view it has towards the small and intimate valley of Pillagua, as well as towards its green surroundings. For this reason the houses direct their views towards the valley and are implanted in the forest, respecting the nature that surrounds them and giving the user a direct relationship with it . The houses were designed with the intention of disappearing into the forest and becoming part of it.
A World of Children – Parents don’t come inside, queridos!
What does a school in the 21st century look like at the transition to the knowledge society? In a rural area in Ecuador. At 2600m altitude. On a slope with 56m gradient. Climate-friendly … The school of the 21st century is open and unique at the same time. We do not know today how we will learn tomorrow, everything imaginable should be possible. We want to build regionally reasonable, but with international standards. High tech and low tech, new and old at the same time.
We take the topography and work with it.
The space is kept as good as possible in its sensation, the slope of the property is understood as an opportunity for the formulation of an exciting sequence of rooms, terraces and views. Each room has the best view of the valley, to Cuenca, while enjoying direct access to the open space.
Project Team: Anna Popelka, Georg Poduschka, Jakub Dvorak, Valerie Assmus, Maximilian Bertl
In the middel of the southern Ecuadorian Andes right away from the city Cuenca – UNESCO World Cultural Capital – PPAG are building the German School Stiehle.
Located in tower #4 of the Centro Corporativo Ekopark, this place is conditioned by various facts. Firstly, this is the only tower of the complex that has a LEED certification, which generates some building, energetic, and equipment requirements. Secondly, the place is a space of 290m2, of which, the 70% is basically part of the underground level, that why there are low lighting and natural ventilation.
The order was to implement a dining room for mainly supplying to the tower but with free access to the general public. It was calculated a daily circulation from 400 to 600 people. We sought an optimum use of the space, exploitation of the entire area, efficient flows, and generate a space that hosts after-office activities.
The average age of users is 35 years old, and they are mostly operations executives of large business; however, the space has to contemplate a diversity of ages and business positions. Additionally, near this tower, it is located one of the campuses of Universidad de las Américas, which also generated a target group that could be potential space users.
A home destined to become quickly a definitive home because the owners were looking for a house that would allow them to leave the rental department soon and thus stop paying endless fees. The challenge was to design the project in a month and to build the house of 65m2 in two months. A house which had to be an affordable one, for this purpose blunt design strategies were defined: to create a structural constructive system that requires little time of execution and covers a large area. Initially the owners looked for a house of containers, nevertheless they required of ample spaces, also had to cover them and modify them reason why the sense of its reuse was lost. For that reason, a system of corrugated rod trusses that allows to contain spaces, was defined concretely and virtually, besides the importance of structuring with our own measures for different uses. The foundation was built quickly with the leftovers from the rods and they were made as piles. The modulation of the house is a function of the material (the trusses are 7.2 meters long), so it is distributed every 1.20 m x 2.40 m in height to receive industrial plates and reduce execution costs. However, in such a fast process we leave space for the spontaneous and the definition in the work in progress.
“Poor is not who owns little, but who needs a lot” Mujica.
Design and construction of a 12 sq.m dwelling, located on the rooftop of an existent building at the popular neighbourhood San Juan in Quito-Ecuador.
Casa parásito (Parasitic house) is a minimal design object, focused in solving the basic habitation necessities for a person or young couple: It includes: bathroom, kitchen, bed, storage space and To-be space ( eating, working and socializing), which secure all the facilities of a dwelling in a reduced area.
Located in Lumbisi, a peripheral town of Quito city, the program is made of two main parts: A house and an architecture studio. The lot had a precarious construction that was totally reused in the new building. The debris where used for land fillings, foundations and re-confined for the fabrication of concrete panels for the new façade. The result is an innovate architecture that didn’t produced construction waste to the environment.
The Project is located in Lumbisí, one of the most ancient indigenous communities in the country. It was colonized by the displacement of the population of Quito, moving towards the peripheral valleys of the city, in search of the countryside and a warmer climate. The lot, was formed by the parceling of a weekend country house developed in the 1980s.
A hug is a type of shelter that provides the security and comfort that is born in the contact of two bodies as a sign of affection. EFE went a few steps beyond the symbolic meaning, to imagine a space that might provide, in addition to that heat, the physical form of a hug.
Casa Roca was born from that visual inspiration. Its curved skin of exposed concrete surrounds the three sides of the construction and offers a cozy privacy in its interior spaces. Windows appear from this solid skin giving birth to beautiful views into the nearby mountains.
Quatro is a set of 9 housing units that engages the domestic space from a condition of diversity of uses. Although the main determinant of the client was 9 “type” dwellings, it is proposed to approach the project under a catalog of occupancies where the basic rules are set by the “programmer” but the opportunities for use are adapted by the user who inhabits them.
The starting point is to give spatial versatility to the user according to their needs and family composition, instead of projecting 9 equal and rigid houses at the programmatic level, a set of rules are proposed in which the rigid space is composed of the wet core of housing and an open structure to different appropriations of the inhabitants, which turns the project into a catalog of houses under a composition of summation of occupancies that vary thanks to the use of furniture as a delimitation resource.
The house is located in Lasso in the province of Cotopaxi. The land is part of “Ranchos San José” in the middle of a rural environment. The commission was to design a family weekend home, to rest and to receive visits.
The proposal contemplate several conditions for its implementation and operation. A passive architecture is proposed, thought from the traditional and the artisan work. The use of local materials or of nearby areas, and workers of the zone, allows us to promote the learning and practice of constructive vernacular systems of Cotopaxi.
Every so often we meet a client who is faced with the decision to buy a new property that might be out of his budget or buy something already built and recondition it.
Our advice always stands out the second option. We believe that is better to take advantage of an existing building and with doing so strengthen the city as it, the challenge is visualize the possibilities.
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