House GZ

This single family house by Studio Cáceres Lazo is located on top of a steep hill, and features amazing unobstructed views of the Chicureo valley landscape, in Santiago de Chile.

Studio Cáceres Lazo, House GZ, Santiago, Chile, 2016
Clients had fallen in love with the beautiful setting of a small community on the outskirts of Santiago. The plot is located on top of a steep hill, with amazing unobstructed views of the Chicureo valley, and with all the utilities’ network down below. Reasonably, the view of the landscape became the house’s raison d’etre. A room without a view – no matter its purpose – was unacceptable. Also, because they had been living in an apartment for quite a while they felt very strongly that everything should fit onto a single floor.

 

A chain-like sequence of rooms became the logical layout for the house, where all of the common areas sit at the center of the chain with the couple’s master bedroom at one end and the children’s and guest rooms at the other. This gives the parents a certain level of independence once the children are older. Next to the kitchen a covered terrace was added to allow for the husband’s preference for grilling – no matter the season or weather.

Studio Cáceres Lazo, House GZ, Santiago, Chile, 2016
Studio Cáceres Lazo, House GZ, Santiago, Chile, 2016
The design was to deliberately avoid creating one-purpose-only spaces, like corridors. The needed corridor was then broken, displaced and distorted, for the pieces not to resemble a corridor. One piece became the entrance hall/gallery space – almost 5 meters tall and lit from the sky – that showcases the client’s incipient art collection. The other, not as tall but twice as wide, became the children’s play/study room. A small patio separates both. Living, kitchen and dining rooms are all integrated into a single space, enclosed by large windows at two sides. Both sides slide back to expand the fun to the adjacent-covered, and outdoor terraces when desired. Boundaries were also blurred at the master bedroom, with just a big walk-in closet dividing it from the bathroom, no doors whatsoever.
Studio Cáceres Lazo, House GZ, Santiago, Chile, 2016
Studio Cáceres Lazo, House GZ, Santiago, Chile, 2016
On the outside, Equitone fiber-cement boards were used to clad the whole of the steel structure that arises from the slab and shapes the house. An air chamber between this skin and the house’s inner envelope is placed to help with its thermal comfort. Because of its color, the cladding and concrete give the house a monolithic appearance, only subverted by the glass facade that faces the panorama.

House GZ, Santiago, Chile
Architect: Studio Cáceres Lazo – Daniel Lazo and Gabriel Cáceres
Collaborators: Alejandra Sepúlveda, John Miller
Area: 280 sqm
Completion: 2016

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