Veranda Courthouse
The private courthouse lies on a south hilly side, with a gentle topographic rise from east to west, in the north suburb of Guangzhou. The architect attempts to reinvent the tradition prototype of Lingnan courtyard house, which was built to response to the local climate and spatial ritual, to an open landscape format based on the site’s topography and scenicology, aiming at a new in-out relationship as well as on-site experience. The symmetric composition of traditional courthouse has been re-assembled to a collection of living spaces, wired up by a veranda loop, and meanwhile, the traditional axal order has also been reorganized to experiences of free wanders and views and in-between the landscape and living spaces.
Veranda Courthouse reinvents the building tectonic out of the traditional courtyard prototype. The core material of stability, the small grey brick, is kept into the new construction, while the flexible parts, the wooden roof and column system, is replaced by steel and reinforced concrete. Each living space is defined by a three-sided grey masonry wall and opens to the landscaping garden. On the open side of each space, a prefab metal opening system is utilized to refer to the traditional rotated screen door. Two different infills, glass and wood, are used to facilitate two different level of openness to the garden, the more public spaces, including living and dining, and more private spaces, mainly bedrooms, of the house, as an enclosed loop of living and landscape itinerary.
