“A long time has passed. The light is blinding, the cold is unusual to this place. I have forgotten what it is like to feel the warmth of human contact. I'm not like others and don't need to hide in the shadows. I have a quilt made of water above me, reflecting the stars and the sky. I am all alone, covered by this quilt that protects me from the harsh light above; it reminds me what I used to be before being invited into the core of the earth.”
How to start a project where two things, as opposite and antagonistic, as the water of a dam and the desert meet? That was the question that triggered this project. There was no logical answer to it, only the sensation of a seemingly beautiful harmony in the landscape in spite of the obvious aggravation of man to the desert by placing such a large body of water in the middle of it. Somehow, the magic of the water gave it life along with some sort of a tragic balance.
Faced with such a situation and scenery, a silent, discreet architecture was needed. The very few elements that had to be included would act as the accents of that beautiful poem given by the distorted nature of the place.
Thus, the house was embedded in the ground, and later a thin layer of water was placed over it to replicate the sky with all its colorful sunsets and sunrises; it would protect the house from the heavy sun and would become a gentle watering place for birds and animals. We made it clear that, everywhere, water is the element that binds man to nature.
We imagined Mariel and her family wrapped in this water blanket while the stars appeared in the sky. Beneath the quilt, we presented a very simple and linear design in which the public areas were oriented towards the body of water and the private areas folded back to open onto a circular courtyard which ventilated and illuminated all spaces.
