Tobogan House

Z4Z4 AAA was given the hard task to represent the inhabitant’s interior world, their trips around the globe, their desire to live in a garden and to embody the cinematic diversity of domestic life.

Z4Z4 AAA Architects designed a private house in Madrid for a family that was looking for a special place able to represent their trips around the globe, their desire to live in a garden and to embody the cinematic diversity of domestic life. The result was the design of two different houses on the same plot.

The Tobogan House is a generic three-storey house on a southern slope. The project juxtaposes two houses and a void that hosts a car parking, an entrance and two staircases. This area works as a thermal regulator between the garden, a picturesque grotto, crossing through the lounge, sauna-fitness center, bar, dining room and kitchen.

One of the houses focuses on daily habits and routines, while the other one is suspended at a double height over the garden. Both are very different from each other in materiality, shape and weight, leaving the intermediate space the most interesting in spatial terms.

The ground floor is contained between two long concrete walls that connect two volumes. Towards the south facade there is a garden for “the Good Life”, towards north lurks the “Grotesque Garden” with a double height greenhouse. Over this green sequence along the plot, a smooth surface, based at ground level, lets nature cross over the slab and the car to pass through one side to the other over the dining-kitchen area.

The upper floor is formed by wrapping three empty cylinders with corrugated iron, curtains, air and mirrors. Inside the cylinders there are 9 rooms padded with wood, cotton, linen and silk, decorated with souvenirs.