Country House in Pila

Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas

Country House in Pila 

DRM Arquitectura

LEAD ARCHITECTS
Arq. Luciano Dimaio, Arq. Nicolás Rocca, Arq. Esteban Muerza

PROJECT TEAM
Arq. Noelia Belén Sera, Arq. Ramiro Barraza, Arq. Augusto Latzke Blake, Arq. Ignacio Llaneza, Arq. Sofia Prytoluk, Arq. Giuliana Scatuerchio, Arq. Lautaro Egui, Arq. Fabián Bruno

ENGINEERING
Ing. Martin Invernizzi

PROGRAM
Single-family House

AREA
160 M²

YEAR
2022

LOCATION
Pila, Argentina

CATEGORY
Houses

200 km from the city of Buenos Aires in a rural environment near the city of Pila, the commission for the renovation of a small house in the vastness of the Pampas plain arises.

Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas
Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas

The field called "El Basson" dedicated to agricultural-livestock activities, and above all linked to a recreational space for the family residing in the city, defines its boundaries with the Salado River, Route 41, and other neighboring fields.

The house had to be transformed to respond to new patterns of use, family growth, family gatherings, work meetings, vacations, etc. Likewise, it was pertinent to intervene in all the elements that were part of the field, such as the mill, A tank, lagoon, bonfire, and afforestation, in a general renovation and conditioning plan.

Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas
Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas

All the spaces had been designed, constructed, and inhabited by relatives who were no longer present.

Understanding that all these preexisting elements had a great symbolic charge and were part of the collective memory of the family, the strategy was always to connect to the site while preserving the preexisting elements and using them as a manual of solutions to generate the new architecture. In this way, the repertoire of solutions would always be inspired and connected to the memory and moments lived in that place, "The Family's Field".

Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas
Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas

The place and its preexisting elements. The horizontality of the landscape, the dominant proportion, which would condition the proportion of the house, its gallery, and the design of the openings, where to look, how to look, how to connect.

The wall condition of the house, two longitudinal load-bearing walls with transverse wooden beams forming roofs and mezzanines, continuing and accentuating that pattern for the expanding sectors. Exposing the wall, revealing the brick, and using the vault with wooden beams that maintain the rhythm of the preexisting elements, thus characterizing the new spaces while respecting the original house.

Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas
Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas

The red ceramic as a complementary material to the green field, is present in the original flooring of the house, which was undoubtedly the ground that the whole family remembered walking on in the shared moments with their ancestors. We understood that this material was important and could unite all the interventions.

It gave rise to the "red points" scattered throughout the field, characterized by their flooring and base, the well, the pool, the Australian tank, the mill, and the house itself use this material, transforming functional spaces for the dynamics of fieldwork into empathic spaces for family use.

Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas
Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas

The sky was an unprecedented landscape for us, the absence of light from the field contrasting with the lights of the sky, from here the stargazing lookout was born, a vertical expansion of the house that also solved a new sleeping space, and the vertical circulation system of the house characterized by a particular entry of daylight.

Two other horizontal expansion operations complete the enlargement of the house. On one hand, in the living/dining area, the search for sunset views filtered through a wisteria pergola, and on the other hand, the search for the shelter of the sleeping spaces under the existing tree forest. Both operations valued the existing north-facing gallery.

Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas
Country House in Pila
© Javier Agustín Rojas

We finished the intervention with two minimal operations, the inclusion of a small pier on the lagoon that made it possible to inhabit it, and the enhancement of a tree with a very particular morphological condition that had already been appropriated by the family to have some barbecues at its feet, giving rise to the bonfire, a radial landscape intervention that encouraged gathering through the inclusion of appropriate flooring and furniture.


Country House in Pila
Ground floor plan
Country House in Pila
First floor plan
Country House in Pila
Roof plan
Country House in Pila
Site plan


Country House in Pila
Long section 01
Country House in Pila
Long section 02
Country House in Pila
Long section - perspective view 01
Country House in Pila
Long section - perspective view 02


Country House in Pila
Axo sketches
Country House in Pila
Exploded axo


Country House in Pila
East + west elevation
Country House in Pila
Front elevation
Country House in Pila
Rear elevation
Country House in Pila
Illustration


Country House in Pila
Painting 01
Country House in Pila
Painting 02


Country House in Pila
Sketch 01
Country House in Pila
Sketch 02


Country House in Pila
Facade process
Country House in Pila
Pergola process