The program of the house developed by Bernardo Cerrato places the day area on the second floor and the private areas of the house on the first floor, organizing the distribution of the interior spaces by use based on the hours of natural light and the required privacy.
The central patio and the communications core of the house are used as natural catalysts of comfort, passively achieving benefits in the energy performance of the house and relying on these two elements as a source of lighting, radiation and natural ventilation for the interior spaces.
House in Guardamar del Segura by Bernardo Cerrato. Photograph by Milena Villalba.
Project description by Bernardo Cerrato
The main problem with the plot is that it only has a narrow façade in relation to its depth: approximately 5 x 19 metres. On the other hand, the different heights of the adjoining buildings made it obligatory to carry out a meticulous study of the resulting volume in order to introduce natural light and try to achieve natural ventilation in all the main rooms of the dwelling.
Starting from a central courtyard as a key element that configures the entire house and the exact position of the vertical communication element, we managed to solve to a large extent the challenge we were facing: to provide the house with spacious and comfortable rooms, to allow light to reach the areas located at the end of the plot and to achieve the necessary privacy for the parts of the programme that the client required.
At a programmatic level, the floor plan is stratified by uses according to the hours of natural light that penetrates the dwelling and the privacy required, resulting in an inversion of the programme that is commonly found on each level: on the first floor are the bedrooms and the more private rooms, and on the second floor the day area.
Following basic principles of thermodynamics, we achieve passive benefits in the energy performance of the house: we rely on this courtyard to use it as a source of lighting and radiation for the day area.
