Architectural Marvel: FALA Atelier's Gravity-Defying Suspended House Pushes Boundaries of Design

In the artery connecting the city centre to its suburbs, where individual houses are being demolished to make way for larger housing developments, designing a new individual house is a delicate undertaking. The façades of the project were created through a combination of both building types, creating a fragile ambiguity. A rational order, following the logic of the plans, is combined with a set of seemingly random elements: row windows, erratic marble frontons, seemingly arbitrary drainpipes and pink marble discs that disrupt the composition. The house is an exercise in both uniqueness and banality.

The interior follows consistent guidelines. An off-centred column serves as a pivot and divides each level into four equal quadrants. There are three levels and the street access is on the middle one. Fixed or adjustable programs uniformly occupy these quadrants, leaving the user to their own devices. The house is a static structure for the fluctuating dynamics of life. Its central column is a condensing, symbolic element, a foundation of these dynamics. Its shape is arbitrary and extravagant, providing unique perspectives to each room. A selection of blue doors interconnect different rooms and decorate the column like superhero capes.

At the lower level, unencumbered and accessible to the garden, the column is slightly elevated from the ground. The floor beneath it is thus easy to maintain, and the delicacy of the entire structure is exposed. A home is always a psychological construction before anything else.

Architects: fala

Area: 270 m²

Year: 2019

Photographs: Ivo Tavares Studio, Frederico Martinho, Laurian Ghinitoiu, Paulo Catrica, Giulietta Margot

Project Team: Filipe Magalhães, Ana Luisa Soares, Ahmed Belkhodja, Lera Samovich, Costanza Favero, Ana Lima, Joana Sendas, Paulo Sousa

City: Porto

Country: Portugal