fernanda canales: maruma house

‘maruma house’ by fernanda canales, mexico city, mexico image © luis gordoa all images courtesy of fernanda canales

mexican architect fernanda canales has completed the ‘maruma house’ in the center of mexico city, to provide a family with a private home amidst the dense urbanization that would still be spacious and open to the exterior. the form consists in the stacking of differently sized concrete boxes sitting over a transparent soft-story to achieve simultaneous exposure and concealment. the ground level is visually separated from the neighbors by the garden that lines the perimeter of the site, additionally separating the house from the plot line and making it independent. the orientation of the residence is such that the linear footprint of the house is placed on the north side to open the southern end to a large yard. large glass walls line this same facade to benefit from plenty of daylight and connect the public living spaces to the outside.

service functions are confined to the basement to intrude as little as possible on the open public floor plan. the first floor contains the private areas: bedrooms and bathrooms, with an accentuated solid-void relationship and series of terraces that reveal or hide the program, with a large rooftop garden overhead. the uniting element between all the components of the dwelling is the dark wooden bookshelf that wraps the staircase and extends into other rooms to become furniture pieces, before making its way into the subterranean level where it unfolds into a wine cellar.

large glass wall envelopes the living area image © sandra pereznieto

garden surrounds the exteriorimage © sandra pereznieto

entranceimage © sandra pereznieto

image © sandra pereznieto

entrance image © luis gordoa

exterior (left) image © luis gordoa (right) image © sandra pereznieto

(left) terrace image ©(right) garden image © luis gordoa

living area open to the exteriorimage © sandra pereznieto

empty living roomimage © sandra pereznieto

living roomimage © sandra pereznieto

corridorimage © sandra pereznieto

interiorimage © sandra pereznieto

interior connections to the outside images © luis gordoa

staircase image © luis gordoa

bookshelves wrap the wallsimage © sandra pereznieto

upstairs image © sandra pereznieto

entrance to rooftop terraceimage © sandra pereznieto

rooftop terraceimage © sandra pereznieto

image © sandra pereznieto

floor plan / level 0

floor plan / level 1

floor plan / level 2

section

section

section

facade

facade

axonometric illustrating the bookshelf

concept render

project info:

architectural design: fernanda canales project team: ángela vizcarra and alberto garcía contractor: alpha hadrin structural engineering: gersón huerta landscape: juan manuell guerra and fritz sigg photography: sandra pereznieto location: mexico city surface area: 500 m2 year: 2011