Courtyard under Longan Trees / Spacework Architects © Spacework Architects
When placing a house on its site, one of the first steps is to recognize the territory that surrounds it, identifying its potentials and tensions. In this process, we inevitably select, cut, hide, or enhance certain views, shaping the architectural experience according to the sensations we wish to foster.
A visual hierarchy is therefore established, guiding the eye and determining what should be seen, in what way, and with what emotional intensity, defining how the user interprets the surroundings. In this context, design strategy goes beyond aesthetic choice and begins to operate as a construction of the phenomenological experience of space. By selecting a specific fragment of the horizon through a controlled opening, or by dissolving the limits between inside and outside with large glazed planes, architecture begins to act as a lens. It can emphasize the smallness of the human scale in relation to the vastness of the territory or, conversely, domesticate nature, incorporating it into everyday life.