- Architecture & development
This newly built home in Oaxaca, Mexico is the answer to a year-long search of its resident. Casa del Alma fulfills a desire for a place where he can reside in the silence of his own company. Here, the local climate rules as his primary companion. Let us introduce you to this edgy property that has nestled itself in a desert-like landscape.
In more than one way, this commission was special for Espacio 18 Arquitectura. Their client can already look back on an impressive life, filled with many travels and explorations. Now, it was time to create a final sanctuary in the reclusiveness of the northern area of Oaxaca, an eye-catching place where nature forms a fixed and central part of daily life. Here, the everyday chaos does not pervade anywhere, resulting in an all-encompassing privacy that is lovely when you are in need of a life in which reflection primes. Yet it was important that the layout of the home would serve several goals. The resident asked the architects to make the private rooms skillfully converge with the social areas to invite company in. The biggest assets that this place offered? The view of the city and the entrance to the property that has been urbanised, among others. The architecture expresses itself through two concrete volumes, which resemble two rocks that seem to have emerged from the ground like the continuation of the nearby mountains. Not coincidentally, together they play the interaction between, on the one hand, the private, and on the other, the social zones. 
It was a deliberate choice to keep the architecture sober in nature
It was of great importance that they correctly considered the Mexican climate. Both horizontally and vertically, the team incorporated several perforations, so that cross ventilation can offer the necessary refreshment. Next to this, a lot of time went to taking care of the light incidence, more specifically by letting domes, beams, and windows engage in a common game. Concerning the aesthetic, it was definitely a deliberate choice to keep the architecture sober in nature. The reason for this is logical: the environment should be able to ripe as the eye-catcher. From the terrace, and through all the windows, you look out on a painting that is difficult to match. Add to this the industrial feeling of the spaces and the open construction that characterises the inside of the building, and you are convinced of the success that baptised this project to the client’s dream home. Wide stairways enhance the greatness of the whole, while the heavily present glass, in turn, contributes to the fundamental connection between the house and the location. And for those who may have doubts about the dominant grey tones of the concrete, the entering rays of sun offer a rebuttal that does not leave room for contradiction, because their warm colours give the design an unmistakable sympathy. 
Casa del Alma has everything that the client needs. In the vastness of an unforgettable place, a team of visionary architects designed a home that makes the nearby nature enjoy the deserved attention. Here, concrete transforms itself into a material that makes both the design and the location into their best versions. 
Photography by César Béjar