The Great Wall Commune (the name given to this private development of upscale dwellings) is in Shui Guan, a location at approximately one hour by car from the north of Beijing. The landscape, characterized by steep hillsides, intricate valleys and a
In a central area of the road that leads to the dwellings of the Commune rises this ‘club house’ or social club, the purpose of which is to complement the houses of the residents or guests with communal facilities, as well as providing permanent acco
The furthermost point from the entrance to the Commune is the site chosen for this house that is ‘split’ into two equal parts to generate varied angles and spaces, aside from attracting the attention to its existence ‘between rivers and mountains’. H
Though the houses on the Great Wall Commune are scattered over different areas of the valley, the plot where this house goes up was in the middle of the woods. Being this the main differential fact, the project suggests creating a ‘covered’ space tha
The original scheme, drawing inspiration from the thick vegetation that characterizes the site of the project, attempts to extend the feeling brought by a walk in the woods and around the house – and therefore a series of pedestrian paths have been b
The more and more evident exterior influence and the stunning speed of the interior development have given rise in the Chinese society to a new work-oriented lifestyle. In an attempt to improve the quality of life, the number of working hours increas
The imposing presence of the Great Wall prompts to search for architectural forms that may seamlessly blend with the landscape instead of being roughly inserted as autonomous and isolated objects. The thousand-year-old stone structure moves through t
Mountain sides always entail an architectural ‘problem’ and a demand which requires a more or less radical design decision. Faced with this generic topographical avatar – present in any hillside of the valley – the house opts, as it name shows, for a
Built on a plot with a steep slope, the house rests a large wall of stone – collected in the surrounding areas – against the hillside. This allows on the one hand to evoke the nearby presence of the Great Wall, and on the other to recall with its lin
Two mechanisms of distortion turn this house into a ‘deformed’ version of the conventional courtyard house: one, in the literal sense, affects the building’s square footprint, whose angles and side length are altered in order to adapt to the topograp
The construction of a house in a natural environment is always determined by two factors: it must pursue the best views, and at the same time avoid obscuring the landscape from other areas of the site. This dwelling on a sloping terrain has been desi
The first sketches of this house took shape after visiting the site, located in the lower area of the complex and close to the point of arrival to the Great Wall Commune. The design consists of a one-story building with a squared floor plan around an
In spite of the domestic appearance of the buildings that make up the Great Wall complex, their touristic purpose and the temporary succession of users allows experiments that the habitual domestic nature rarely admits. Within this context of manifes
