Studio Saxe decided to design and develop its first vertical sustainable building, proving that it is financially viable to create an architecture of value focused on quality of life through large terraces and planting, within the constraints of the local economy.
Article source: YUSO – Arq. José Antonio (Toño) Salas
Located in San Jose de Costa Rica, HOUSE OF HOUSES is a project developed by YUSO together with an extraordinary family: a US-American professor and single mother, her daughter and son who only live at home a few days per week as they spend the remaining time with their other mother and father, and their grandfather, who has an active and independent life.
The Edward M. Dowd Art and Art History Building at Santa Clara University unites formerly scattered studio and academic programs within a new 45,000-square-foot facility designed by Form4 Architecture to promote innovation, creativity, and collaborative learning. Tradition and innovation are blended into a confident scheme where art is produced, reflected upon, recorded, and narrated. The new building is part of a major redesign of the northwest side of campus into a vibrant creative district, and positions the art and art history department near theater, music, and dance facilities.
Qalma is a vertical condominium which is developed in a reduced footprint, leaving a large percentage of green area, respecting the existing wooded area in the property and conserving 90% of all the trees grown on the site.
A fundamental issue in the conceptualization of the project is the definition and interpretation of biophilia implemented in a vertical tower of apartments; inhabiting a space and in this case in particular a vertical condominium, must be resolved to meet the needs of its inhabitants, the priority is to improve the quality of life of those who inhabit the architecture, this can be achieved by integrating nature within the apartments and within common areas; A first approach to achieve this is by enabling common areas with privileged locations within the tower, in this way we can integrate the experience not only inside apartments but also outside them, the common areas are located in the last three levels of the tower, creating experiential relationships in height, another implemented method was to bring nature within the verticality of the project and inscribe it around the perimeter of the tower, the idea is to create a natural environment in height.
Natú, a hybrid project for its horizontality and verticality, is conceptualized by seeking to adapt to the terrain and thus modify the natural topography to the minimum, which allows the use of the views towards “Parque del Este”. Likewise, it is proposed to incorporate green areas to each housing unit through garden slabs. The volumetry and aesthetic quality is favored by the presence of its natural counterpart, seeking to provide a particular experience through the integration of natural ecosystems as circuits within the project.
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.
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.
This house establishes an uninterrupted ¨inside-outside¨ relationship; a sequence of layers between the open and the intermediary. Frontal boundaries are blurred by sheets of glass and vegetation, framed by two horizontal planes, floor and ceiling, where the full and the void are related via a series of matter, water, vegetation and sky. Lateral boundaries establish the ¨full-void¨ relationship via a series of solid materials that close transversal views.
A solid, natural, and warm object makes us question what is inside. Soft lines, symmetrical composition, plotted openings, and small rays of light peek inside. The thrill of slipping between pointillism in each sharp element contrasts with the tranquility and passivity of light reflected in its shadow; a double faced complexity.
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