Casa Las Tinajas

This project is developed around a central garden filled with pre-existing plants. Surrounding this green space, six independent volumes—all with a locally made palapa roof—adopt the proportions and characteristics of the program they accommodate. Five of these volumes are private and similar; with the aim of erasing the limits that naturally appear with the presence of a building, and seeking to restore the original sensation and experience to the site, their façades are identical and open both onto the interior of the garden and to the exterior of the property, aiming to give the same importance to the sea to the south as to the sierra to the north. The sixth volume is completely different from the others: it consists of a circular palapa, 12 meters in diameter, that houses all the public uses of the program in its interior and that, intersected with a geometrical volume like those described above, completes the whole.

Puerto Escondido, Oaxaca, 2009

1,580 sqm

Photographs: Ignacio Urquiza / ESTUDIO URQUIZA Taller de fotografía

Casa Macaria

Located on the Oaxaca coast, this project explores the vernacular and traditional elements of Mexican Pacific architecture and observes the ways in which the elements interact with the habitable space through an indefinite sequence of open areas. The project’s spaces and functional aspects blend into the surrounding landscape thanks to the use of artisanal construction methods such as palapas.

The project consists of a series of eight palapas located on the plot, responding to the orientation and vegetation of the existing wetland. Their varying dimensions in plan and section, as well as their layout, depart from the traditional relationship between interior and exterior spaces, allowing the vegetation and landscape to be part of a symbiotic relationship.

Puerto Escondido, Oaxaca, 2008

1,500 sqm

Photographs: Ignacio Urquiza / ESTUDIO URQUIZA Taller de Fotografía