Mini-Studio
Silver Medal at the XII Biennial of Mexican Architecture
Limited to only 27sqm of footprint, this art workshop is nested in a small gap originally occupied by a storage-room (between 3 existing buildings), in the backyard of a middle-class house at Mexico City.
For his personal workshop, the client requested a small studio able to stimulate the imagination and creativity; Free of furniture to enhance flexibility. To achieve it, we conceived a dynamic and fluid space, which despite of its size, it feels very spacious.
With a careful control of perspective and using trapezoidal shapes, vanishing points are emphasized, amplifying the space scale.
One of the main challenges was to avoid the entry of direct sunlight into the space, without cancelling the view towards the garden. To achieve this, the upper-level volume thrusts itself southward to project its shadow over the large (ground floor) window that connects the studio with the exterior.
The sloped roof slabs block away the solar rays from the working area, allowing the subtle entrance of uniform light over the double-height ceilings which communicate both levels.
The mezzanine launches itself towards the exterior dissolving the outline marked by the floor, to end suspended over the garden, integrating it to the space. At the same time, the ground floor glazed door, opens from side to side to completely vanish the border between interior and exterior.
A geometric gesture at the top of the south façade produces a size changing triangular shadow throughout the day, providing movement to the volume.
