C47 Penthouse | El Tejado Azul

I constantly try to view architecture from outside the bubble of awareness about it. From there one can see a common dilemma between how people want to live and how to dream up and design an architectural project. Within this debate, some people reproach the lack of general interest in architectural culture (the culture that shelters us); whilst others attribute the dilemma to the need to justify how one wants to live or the desires one “should” have. In the middle of this conundrum, one can always hear a voice, saying that architecture expresses itself in a language which doesn’t facilitate this dialogue.

What is certain is that architecture needs to make the inhabitant happy, and furthermore, it has a responsibility with its time. Part of being able to plan effectively is the capacity to understand the visions of people, whilst rising above them, because a home isn’t only the biggest investment in a person’s life, but also the materialisation of their childhood dreams. “When I’m grown up, I want to live like that.” It’s the job of architects to be wizards and make this dream a physical reality, at the same time drawing on all their knowledge. The greatest homes in the history of architecture have had a big client behind them. The reformation project of Ático C47 (Attic C47) by the Valencian studio El Tejado Azul (The Blue Roof) is a perfect example of how this balance presents a significant architectural task. This great exercise in project planning, with a delicate and careful physical execution of 100m2, is situated in the Ruzafa neighbourhood on the Ensanche (Expansion District) of Valencia.

The reform began with a practically complete dismantling of the system of divisions of the former house, thus creating a tabula rasa (a blank page) in search of the maximum expressivity and lightness of the spaces. This moment of the process, when the structure becomes a patent and one can understand the three dimensional emptiness, inevitably influences and alters the preconception of the project. In this way, the intentions of the architect combined with those of the client start to take shape and occupy the blank canvas.

During this process of stripping back to the radical construction, enclosures were withdrawn, such as the one surrounding the terrace (which looked more like a little bracket), as well as the skin of the structural system of pillars and hanging beams. “The condition set out by the client was that the materials should be very expressive and honest, thus nearly being in their raw state. The new materials are natural iron and pine,” Cristina Cucinella, the studio architect, explains. To these new materials, exposed concrete from the original structure was added.

The new organisation of the house is sequential, in order to eliminate the possibility of residual space and reducing the spatial element to its maximum sincerity: one room leads you into another, without hallways, with light and materiality being the only connectors and the gradation of functions the only divisor. The new distribution marks a clear division between the day and night zones through a central space in which the study and bathroom are situated, like a neutral, intermediary room. Access is made in the day area, and in a rather direct and unusual way, leads straight into the kitchen. At the end of the house, in the quietest area are the two bedrooms.

Upon beginning the journey throughout the house, the first sensation is the hegemonic presence of the kitchen, which is in an L shape and the heart of the day zone, complemented by a dining area and living room and hugging the light-filled terrace, now freed from the walls which surrounded it. It’s no coincidence that Quique, one of the owners is passionate about gastronomy, and that he wanted the most life-filled, active spaces to be centred around the powerful kitchen island, continuing with the dining table, whilst in the corner the lounge area is situated.

From here, begins a continuous flat storage space, which corresponds to the middle wall, crossing and connecting the whole house. In the kitchen-living space one can find pine shelving, which converts itself into cupboards and storage space upon crossing the pivoting door which separates the central space. In this centre which acts as a hinge, the study and bathroom area are neutralised, presented in (bi-chrome) black and white marked by materiality. Large sliding iron doors enclose the storage area, spilling over its limits and extending them further, up to the wooden shelving at one end and to the bedrooms at the other.

At the back, the nocturnal space opens onto the wide courtyard within the apartment block, a very typical element of the urbanism of the Ensanche, flooded with light from the bedrooms. In this area of the home, the ‘porch’ space is enhanced, by the use of wooden volumes which give way to the openings: just like a child’s game, gapped wooden boxes create an “interior balcony,” retrieving/making use of the irregularities of the floor, creating a compartment within a compartment. The flooring, also made of wood, but of a whiteness which permits for the lightness of the bedrooms, directs itself by following the line of the dividing wall and the pathway of the light.

The intervention of El Tejado Azul is subtle, logical and sincere. Simultaneously, it resolves the needs of the clients and their whimsical desires. However, this isn’t everything, there’s something else...

On a day when you’re feeling strange, you can imagine opening secret doors, sheltering yourself with a good book in one of the wooden boxes. This home makes the dweller happy, finding the illusion of a sheltered life in its rooms, and this is a raw material that architecture should never forget.