The valley of Hadira presents itself as an embrace of slopes that gradually descend towards a water canal — just under the proposed site, to finally connect to the Mediterranean to the west where beautiful sunsets can be experienced daily. The residential area of Mtayleb/Hadira offers a quiet and natural environment for the family houses that two sisters, Soraya and Shermeen, envisage as their familial and natural haven.
The disfigured site where a concrete structure to be transformed already existed looks at first like quarry where a significant 12m concrete wall sits right behind the now totally flat ground. Finding the constraint absurd yet extreme, we wish to transcend it materially and conceptually. We propose to dematerialize the wall by rendering it as a vertical garden, almost directly reminiscent of the Metn valleys nearby, with the necessary rocks and variety of native shrubs and bushes, as for the ground it should become the natural expression of that landscape merging back to the valley below.
The result should be a sort of ‘trompe l’œil’ that would make the back wall disappear while the house would sit on the garden grounds. The orthogonal house in its turn creates a ‘mineral contrast’ with its radical and minimal stone texture punctuated by over-scaled glass openings. The disconcerting simplicity of the approach in its simplicity and minimalism insists on primordial effects of contrast: transparency vs. opacity, mineral vs. vegetal, orthogonal vs. organic. We believe that such clarity of language re-infuses onto the site the strong sense of naturalness that is certainly still there in the wonderful panoramic view but also lost by the flattening and the back wall.
Two slight differences of texture (the one closer to the ground vs. the one closer to the sky) indicate on the facade the intertwined presence of two houses within the house. The lower one, André and Soraya’s would occupy the whole of the ground floor (extending to the surrounding garden) and ⅔ of the first, while the upper one, Shermeen’s would occupy the rest of the first floor and the second floor (extending this time to the rooftop as her main outdoor space.) Both houses however are villa-like in their conception and their intertwining on the facade reinforces that non-stacking effect. Internally, patios, internal staircases, integrated libraries and hidden doors create custom-made world where every program deploys itself according to the idiosyncrasies of each sister’s requirements.
For Soraya, André and family, key features include an inside-out cat house, private man-cave merging with a TV room, with sliding partitions to modulate such relations. Towards the garden, radical floor to ceiling glazing, entertainment areas and a pool towards the sunset view.
For Shermeen, an artist’s studio on the first floor with its public entrance for production of art and its exhibition, an exploded plan on the second floor with separate private quarters, a central dining table as banquet, a kitchen island for informal events, patios and skylights to the suspended garden rooftop, with a spa volume, suspended pool and various entertainment amenities.
All in all it is the pleasure of reconnecting to nature that motivates the mineral house. Returned to its primordial expression, this architecture renders the spirit of Hadira alive again.
Project in collaboration with Joëlle Chaftari.
Project Status: Under Construction.
Designed by Karim Nader with Soumer Al-Kamand, Anthony Barakat.