Five patios for one house, Vila Nova de Gaia

CONTEXT
The aim is to design a single-family home that explores an intense relationship with the exterior space.

The available land is part of a plot that is in an advanced phase of construction and is already perfectly delimited and enclosed by partition walls, shared with its neighbours.

STRATEGY
The plot in question occupies an exceptional position in the urban fabric, allowing for a different approach to that of the others: instead of the typical central layout, two storey volumetry and a reduced and narrow garden all around the house, the proposed residence will stretch the plot in a single storey, thus creating five outdoor spaces with distinct qualities, dimensions and proportions.

The surrounding wall that outlines the entire space, against which the volumes that make up the house lean or move away from, thereby establishes the boundaries of construction that allow for the concurrent design of an interior space, which houses the main programme, and a set of exterior spaces, or empty spaces full of nature, that benefit from an intimate and introspective atmosphere, isolated from the urbanised surroundings.

EXPERIENCE
The house is one-storey and continuous, in a succession of spaces that is organised by a hierarchy of intimacy(ies) established between service spaces, shared spaces and private spaces. Its geometry and formalisation are not without significance to the strategic location of the glazed openings, which seek a relationship with the outside, forming an alternating game of dimmed and lit spaces, creating distinct atmospheres of pause and silence.

On arrival from the outside, the porch marks the entrance and parking area, shaping an ample shaded area that announces an inner world. Inside, the successive spaces extend to the adjoining outdoor patios, increasing the perception of spaciousness by emphasising its depth through a series of visual planes: the creation of outdoor universes, defined and enclosed, thematically feeds the interior spaces as it draws the sky in, into the interior of each one of the spaces.

Architecture
Diogo Aguiar Studio

Team
Diogo Aguiar, Daniel Mudrák, Adalgisa Castro Lopes, Jorge Otaegi, João Teixeira, Liam Romo

Engineering
Pedro Castenheira

Client
Private

Size
250 m²

Status
2022 - under construction

Images
DAStudio