CASA [EN]COSTA

"The plot is a privileged location on the slopes of the Penha Mountains, overlooking the beautiful city of Guimarães.The local complexity, topography and solar orientation, together with the beautiful view of the imposing landscape create the powerful driving forces that we wanted to see reflected in this house.The house is two rectangles connected to each other, an “H” arranged in a way that enhances the land, the light and the views. The scheme is very logical, “H” generates an arrival patio where the volumes articulate and move away from each other.The house offers two levels of social spaces and services in the foreground with the city. On the walls of the living rooms and kitchens, we opened large windows that favor the search for horizontal light, transparency and the views that are revealed there.At a higher level, it is reserved for the private and most intimate spaces of the rooms. And in the same search for light, once again, the landscape framed there will be the most beautiful.Outside, between volumes, the house extends, in a large exterior patio, in the open sky as in an exercise in the search for the maximum vertical light ratio."