Hasta La Ideas

Rammed earth walls and a glass outhouse feature in this rural Ecuadorian house by architectural studio Al Borde that is meant to challenge standards of comfort.

The Casa Jardin, or Garden House, is located in Conocoto, a rural area south of Ecuador’s capital Quito. It was designed for a client, José, who studied ecology and desired a home that felt seamless between inside and out.

While conceiving the design, Quito-based Al Borde studied the Cochasquí archaeological site in northern Ecuador, where the architects found replicas of houses built by a pre-Inca civilization.

“The house was structured from a circular, rammed-earth wall built around a Lechero tree of approximately four metres high, planted in the centre during construction time,” the team said.

Taking inspiration from the ancient ruins, the studio came up with an unconventional home made of natural materials and afforded a strong connection to the landscape.

The home consists of three separate structures: the main dwelling, a bathing area and a water closet. One must pass through the outdoor garden to access each building.

“José and his house question the comfort standards,” the team said. “There are places where people do not know whether they are in a garden or house, or a house built by the garden.”

Rectangular in plan, the main dwelling has a single, large room that holds a kitchen, dining area and sleeping quarters. There also is a space for the client’s books and drum set.

Rammed-earth blocks were use to form three of the walls. The fourth is made of glass and wood.

“The same soil removed in the excavation was used for load-bearing adobe walls,” the architects said. “They rest on a stone foundation that also works as a skirting board.”

The roof consists of wooden staves, waterproof fabric, and tiles made of earth and brick. Weeds are intended to sprout up between the bricks.

A front patio is shaded by a large overhang made of a polycarbonate panels and chaguarqueros branches. The canopy is supported by felled Euphorbia laurifolia trees – also known as Lechero trees – that will take root and regenerate.

“Over the years, new branches and leaves will grow, allowing the tree to follow its life cycle,” the team said.

A simple shower is housed in a greenhouse made of polycarbonate panels and Lechero trunks. Nearby is the outhouse – a glazed enclosure that is sheltered by a canopy held up by tree trunks.

“Pooping for José is a ritual,” the architects said. “Between him and nature, there is only glass.”

“We imagine that guests will have many anecdotes to tell after visiting him,” they added.

The property also features a permaculture system that was developed and built by the client.

Sewage is treated via a system with red worms, and gray water is treated with dwarf papyrus, a type of pond plant. The filtered water is used to irrigate fruit trees.

Moreover, organic waste is turned into compost, which serves as fertiliser for the property’s vegetables and medicinal plants.

“Native-wild plants have been kept to attract insects and birds from the area, controlling the proliferation of possible plagues,” the client said. “It works as a biological control in situ.”

Al Borde is led by principals David Barragán, Esteban Benavides, Marialuisa Borja and Pascual Gangotena.

The Ecuadorian studio is also behind the House of the Flying Beds – a renovated 18th-century home that has sleeping spaces suspended from the ceiling.

The photography is by Juan Alberto Andrade.

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The latest edition of our Dezeen Weekly newsletter features TYPE’s conversion of the dilapidated Redhill Barn in Devon, England.

Architecture studio TYPE has converted the barn into a house and readers are impressed with the look and finish.

However, they aren’t convinced by its layout. One said, “Beautiful reuse, but are we hauling the dinner upstairs?”

Other stories in this week’s newsletter include a former 15th-century convent in Corsica, Philippe Starck’s design for a modern gondola, and BIG’s CityWave building in Milan.

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No, this isn’t an alien planet. It’s a psychedelic work of art by Dasha Plesen using paints, pigments, foodstuff, and bacterial/fungal cultures from everyday life.

I don’t know about you, but when I see mold growing on something, my knee-jerk reaction is to throw it away. Daria Fedorova, on the other hand, busts out her camera, mounts a macro lens, and gets to work! Fedorova’s psychedelic artworks are more of a collaboration than anything else. She uses paints, yeasts, foodstuff, and biofilms to compose her art pieces, introduces microscopic fungal and bacterial cultures to the mix, and then lets nature take over as the molds grow on top of her abstract pieces of art, giving it a new appearance altogether.

Fedorova (who goes by her online moniker Dasha Plesen) hopes to redefine what it means to “create” art, and to explore how much of a role she plays in the creation. A lot of the artwork’s process is unpredictable, as Fedorova just allows the cultures to incubate over a period of 3-4 weeks, growing on top of the canvas she creates. The Russia-based artist spent 7 years researching microcultures and learning how to develop and control them. Most of her artwork occurs in controlled environments inside Petri dishes, and her microculture samples come from a variety of places, including “air, surroundings, body, and objects”, according to the artist.

It’s worth noting that no two molds/cultures in her artpieces are the same. They come from different locations and samples, and are the result of multiple natural bacterial and fungal colonies naturally propagating. Fedorova’s experimented with bodily fluids (like sweat, saliva, mucus, and milk) and even decorated her art with sprinkles and granules of sugar, adding pops of color to her “disgusting” art. The results are undeniably fabulous, that is, if you can somehow get yourself to look beyond the fact that those microbiotic cultures are incredibly unhealthy and potentially dangerous if exposed to humans (Fedorova does make it a point to safely dispose of them once she’s done). However, they make for great prints (Fedorova actually sells posters and tee-shirts)… and if you’re into NFTs, you can get your hands on some “CryptoFungi” too!

Designer: Daria Fedorova (Dasha Plesen)

For those who don’t have enough screens in their lives, this week Facebook’s hardware division announced their forthcoming Portal Go. It’s a 10″ screen with a handle built into the back. The wireless device charges on a magnetic puck and is essentially a “smart” speaker designed for videoconferencing.

Facebook’s projected use cases:

The Portal Go is just one of four Portal devices that Facebook makes or will be making. They’ve already got a conventional plug-in 10″ screen and a separate device that beams videoconferences to your TV. Next month they’re rolling out the Portal Go alongside a conventional plug-in 14″ screen.

Why? To maintain relevance, Facebook needs to get products into homes that displace what their competitors are making. It’s keeping-up-with-the-Joneses product design.

I think when archaeologists 10,000 years in the future are in the middle of a dig, and pull one of these out of the rubble, one will turn to the other and say “Why did 21st-century humans need all these screens?”

“We’re not sure yet,” another will say. “But keep digging, the answer’s gotta be in here somewhere.”

Dezeen promotion: a community garden that transforms produce waste from a street market into fertiliser is among a series of installations created by eight artists and architects for a mixed-use urban area in the Eastern District of Hong Kong.

The installations, which are currently on view, were unveiled on 30 August as part of Via North Point – a festival in the North Point Community – one of Hong Kong island’s oldest neighbourhoods.

“North Point is one of the oldest neighbourhoods on Hong Kong island full of stories of many generations,” said the Hong Kong Arts Centre. “It has remained very local, old, and traditional for many years until recently as the district is rapidly facing gentrification when new, modern private property is being built.”

The festival, spearheaded by Hong Kong Arts Centre and sponsored by the city’s Urban Renewal Fund since 2019, encourages visitors and locals to engage with this lively area of the city.

This year’s showcased installations are the result of a competition that was launched in January 2021 calling upon urban space designers, experts and enthusiasts to reimagine the neighbourhood, which has undergone major redevelopment in the past 20 years.

Of the nearly 80 entries received, six were chosen to be brought from concept to reality. These six selected land-sited works are complemented by two commissioned floating installations.

Scattered from Chun Yeung Street to the sea east of North Point Public Pier, each installation is based upon independent research into North Point neighbourhood, observations of users’ behaviour and lengthy discussions with local residents.

Addressing different aspects of the neighbourhood’s needs and aspirations, many of the concepts advocate for sustainability through biodiversity and up-cycling while others encourage social interaction within the community.

Local architecture firm MLKK Studio responded to the beautiful chaos of the market street by creating A Cycle of Life, a food waste collection point and community garden in Chun Yeung that transforms produce waste into fertiliser and energy to benefit the community.

Also included is the Symphony of North Point by ARTA Architects’ interactive sound exchanging device that amplifies the sounds of North Point while encouraging youth to make music.

AaaM Architects’ Hangout Islands presented a series of plant-filled summer pavilions that are dotted along the North Point pier providing a relaxed beach-style environment for people of all ages to socialise.

Also included is O&O Studio x REhyphenation’s North Pointer project, which features a series of old chairs that were collected from North Point schools, households and street stalls.

Now installed along the public pier, the chairs are accompanied by audio recordings of their former owners’ memories of the area. Passersby can listen to them by scanning a QR code.

Jason Lee Lok-sun presented Sugar Factory, which encourages street fitness along the waterfront with a nod towards sugar refineries of the past.

Also showcased is #TackPoint by #TackTeam, which is a public art installation made from used plastic bottles collected in the area.

In addition to the land installations, two floating installations reflect upon bygone days of swimming in the Victoria harbour while proposing ways towards a greener future.

Re-imagining Collective Swimming in North Point is a floating bamboo structure by multidisciplinary design studio Yucolab that recalls the once-popular swimming decks and huts that used to populate the neighbourhood.

Ocean Imagineer by French-Japanese designer Cesar Jung-Harada examines how oyster farming can increase aquatic biodiversity and enhance water quality while producing energy to sustain the practice.

The installations are accompanied by further series of artworks, related tours, workshops and activities that run throughout the month of September.

“Via North Point Festival is the culmination of our vision to engage the community through public art and spatial place-making,” said Hong Kong Arts Centre in a statement.

“It seeks to increase North Point residents’ 15-minute circle of living with art that inspires them to venture further. It encourages the area’s walkability and invites new contemplation of old spaces viewed through a more artistic lens. Through its top-down meets bottom-up approach, it facilitates cultural citizenship as people take ownership and pride in their district.”

Via North Point Festival runs until 30 September 2021.

For more information about Via, North Point Festival visit its website.

Partnership content

This article was written by Dezeen for Hong Kong Arts Centre as part of a partnership. Find out more about Dezeen partnership content here.

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