Status  The construction started in December 2013. The house is meant to be finished in the Autumn of 2014.

Location  Collado Mediano, Madrid, Spain.

Site  1,532 square metres

Brief  To design a simple, sober private residence for a family of four currently living in Madrid. The house is at first to be used as a holiday home, and in the future, the clients plan on spending their retirement there. For that reason, the house needed to be suitably designed, taking into account the extreme summer and winter climate conditions in the area.

Program  250 square metres of residence

• Kitchen
• Sitting Room
• Study
• Terrace
• Garage (1 car)
• 4 Bedrooms
• 3 Bathrooms
• Entrance

Background  The site is located in the small housing community of “Reajo del Roble” in the municipality of Collado Mediano. This community is on the shore of the Navacerrada Reservoir, in the National Park of the Sierra de Guadarrama. Since the construction of the community predates the creation of the park, it has been allowed to remain. The estate has received permission to finish developing the few remaining plots of land left on the grounds. Aside from this, further urban development has been forbidden. The geographical situation of the site is ideal, a beautiful rural location surrounded by mountains, with views of the Siete Picos mountain range and the Bola del Mundo Mountain, with nearby ammenities in Collado Mediano and Navacerrada and within an hour’s drive from Madrid.

Personal Intention  I have fulfilled my remit by creating a severely simple, almost sparse space, adapted to the character of the client. The concept and the subsequent design of this house were based on the desire that everything should be subordinated to the site and the location. The building adapts itself to show the land, the trees and the mountains to their best advantage. For that reason, the bedrooms are located on the lower floor and the public spaces are on the top floor where the views of the mountains are framed by the pine and oak trees on site. I referenced the prototypical alpine building style, prevalent in the area, with the steep pitched wooden roof and the local materials used (granite, slate and pine) but I strip the traditional model of all excess ornament and weight. By having public and private spaces switch levels and by using a modern steel and concrete structure I have been able to open up the house, reveal its structure and wooden roof and flood it all with light.

The house is located in the southwest corner of the site facing north to take advantage of the views and to free up as much of the plot as possible. The house is accessed from the street by a slope and the front door leads into a hall that bisects the entire house, leading directly to the back door. This hall organizes the spaces and directs the flow of people up into the public area, into the bedrooms or out onto the grounds. The bedrooms are all of similar size except the northwest master bedroom that has an advantage in size and in views. Each two bedrooms share one private bathroom. The simple stairs lead the visitor to the luminous first floor. On this floor the different spaces (sitting room, kitchen, study) have not been separated or divided to promote a sense of the communal space and shared light and to allow the wooden roof to be appreciated as a unit. The only exception is the small lavatory and the terrace that the kitchen leads out onto. On this level, the main focus is on the windows framing the northern view and the wooden roof structure that covers the entire space.