House in Aldeia da Serra / home Mariante - 2001
São Paulo office design MMBB, formed by Fernando de Mello Franco, Marta Moreira and Milton Braga and at that time also by Angelo Bucci. The House in Aldeia da Serra is designed in a peculiar terrain, uphill, of 20x40. From the street upwardly, the topography is interrupted by a gap that generates a small plateau in front of the batch, which further continues up to eight meters gap.
The shape of the house is marked with a prism, the dimensions 16.20x16.20, which rises only supported in four points.
The program is distributed on three floors:
> Ground Floor: The street level is partially free, as only one corner of the square area is occupied (service area and dependencies of employees). The remaining space is used as a garage. This characteristic is clearly modernist, already explored at length (perhaps not as much as we would like) in various projects of the twentieth century, and its most popular application in the Villa Savoye.
> Upper Floor: The intermediate level focuses most of Mariante family needs program (bedrooms, bathrooms, kitchen, living room) and is also the most prominent design element. The deck itself a closed prism with compressed concrete panels and wood on the side (with windows tape, which open using an interesting system similar to the parallel ruler with low sill), and glass walls in overall length , easily stands out in the gated community in Aldeia da Serra, full of houses with "styles". Both volumetric solution as the plant resemble the homes designed by Vilanova Artigas and Paulo Mendes da Rocha, with whom, incidentally, MMBB already made the partnership on several projects.
> Terrace: The act of releasing the ground, and also to use the rooftop terrace as pavement, it was the way that architects met to make the most of the land, creating a leisure space connected by walkways to the land fund and a mirror water which aids in thermal comfort of the residence.
As in Dall'Ava Villa Koolhaas, the relationship between architecture and nature occurs via interfaces, either cover the water (even if it can not swim here), the transparency is allowed by the glass panes, and the ground ascending .
Circulation is another interesting point. It takes place in the center of the residence, which enclose openings two flights of stairs with overhead lighting, linking the three floors.
The Trek, promenade where translucent is literal in this gated community in Aldeia da Serra, cause shock to the traditionalist idea of living. The activities that take place at home, especially in the living / dining room and office, are wide open to the neighborhood. The projectual attitude reflects not only the minds of architects, but Courage Mariante family, who dared to question the model followed by all the other houses of that community: a model where private and public not only has a thick abyss of masonry and small openings, but also a social abyss, conceived in pastiches and ornamental details of ultraeclética architecture *.
The construction system used is a case apart, perhaps worthy of a post in the future. Two ribbed slabs (such as a waffle), built on site using 0.90x0.90 plastic molds give the lightness required to sustain the prism, supported on four pillars. The water tank rests on the sequel to one of four supports.
The internal walls were all made in reinforced mortar, all the windows have no frames, running tracks. The internal floors are granilite, and external sanded concrete.
Also noteworthy is the fact that while this project in Sierra Village was being developed, the MMBB also projected a house in Ribeirao Preto, that being Sister House Mariante, possess similar concepts adopted in a different context.
The House Mariante, built in the beginning of XXI Century, strongly demonstrates the idea that architecture should be a reflection of the contemporary. Its materiality and spatiality becomes real through current construction techniques.