Architects:Saola Architects

Area :100 m²

Year :2021

Photographs :François Hervy

Lead Architect :Somphonsack Phayouphorn

City : Vientiane

Country : Laos

A family house - The transformation of a family house consists of inserting an artist residency program that will allow them the opportunity to live and work outside of their usual environment, providing them with time to reflect, research, and produce work.

The context - The property is diversely composed of abutting buildings. The Canon business is on the main street, while Barn Saylom Loft Apartments is at the rear of the site, with the family home adjacent. A small distribution alley leads to a dead end to the site. The existing building has a strong identity marked by its regular and uniform three-dimensional structure, and the main balcony facade composed of breeze blocks characterizing the colonial era. The interior spaces are isolated from the outside world at the expense of the notion of comfort.

The project description - The vision of the project suggests a mise en abyme. Within the family house, there is a tiny house with a garden. The intervention on the existing building consists in freeing the spaces. To carve out the volume of the interior on the horizontal and vertical planes. The void on three floors allows the wind and natural light to penetrate the heart of the building and enlighten the existing structure and façade.  A new landscape is born.

The new family house entrance opens onto the new garden, consisting of a central gravel plaza and longitudinal steps. An auditorium, seating arrangement as the audience faces the urban scene, the existing building rises to form a theatrical decor and as a theme, a romanticization of a post-colonial ruin. The entire ground floor is suitable for events. Under the steps, the kitchen as a living room becomes the central core for gatherings. Starting from the plaza and in the continuity of the steps to the second floor, the open space art gallery opens onto the urban scene and the interior garden. In addition, the art gallery turned into a private space by partitioning it, thus becoming a studio apartment.

A wooden cocoon delimits the gallery and the water room. The volume is finely cut horizontally at 360 degrees with a view of a secret garden overlooking the sky. Filling up with water, it is a space that, every day, gives a Rendez-Vous to the sun at noon sharp for a bath of light. Empty, the cocoon converted into a library, lounge, or simply a space for reverie.

The metamorphosis - The reinterpretation of the family heritage proposes a personal reflection on a process of social and lifestyle transformation. The composition of open and closed spaces generates a new dynamic between the past and today's world. It is an intergenerational dialogue translated into materials and spaces. The intervention is an opportunity to reconfigure the interaction between the surrounding buildings. By redesigning the spatial relationships, the intention is to restore the symbolic and native role of a family house in the center of the property as a place of life, reception, and welcome. It is also a multifunctional open space, a semi-public space to encourage meetings and exchanges and thus promote socio-cultural activities.