Rancho del Abuelo is an equestrian complex located in Jalisco, on the outskirts of Guadalajara. Its program brings together spaces dedicated to the shelter and care of horses with others intended for pause, dwelling, and contemplation, establishing different ways of inhabiting and engaging with the landscape and equestrian life.
The project is organized around a series of new pavilions distributed across the site, whose placement responds to the existing features and particular conditions of the landscape. Each pavilion accommodates a program with its own specific requirements, leading to the search for a common architectural system capable of bringing unity to the ensemble without imposing a uniform solution upon its spaces.
An elemental structure is thus established: a horizontal concrete roof supported by a sequence of columns of the same material. This logic is repeated throughout the pavilions, forming the underlying order of the project. Beneath it, a series of independent walls encloses and defines the spaces according to the particular needs of each program.
Working with the same material palette, other walls move beyond a strictly functional role to shape the experience of moving through the architecture. Their arrangement contains, directs, and frames, establishing different relationships with the site’s existing elements and the surrounding landscape. The separation between these walls and the roof allows light, air, and the canopies of the trees to remain present within the architecture.
In this way, a deliberately simple structure serves as a framework for a variety of spatial conditions. Repetition establishes order; the walls introduce specificity. Together, they give rise to passages, courtyards, shadows, and openings that connect the different pavilions to the existing conditions of the ranch.
