For the Grandparents’ House we were approached by a retired German couple that was looking to build a house close to where their grandchildren lived in Chile that would allow them to enjoy their company over various months every year. Their brief was simple – they wanted a cozy and luminous home, on a budget, that could work well as a rental property during the months they’re away.

To make the most of the superb views towards the Pacific to the northwest, and the Andes mountains to the east, the house was located on a small plane on the highest part of an otherwise heavily sloped terrain.

The house’s compact plan aims to condense the program into an interior layout that can be perceived by its occupants at a single glance while at the same time minimizing the floor area dedicated to circulations. Also, the compact form allowed for the house to be situated as far as possible from the access road and the sloped part of the terrain.

With the aim of providing ocean views to as many rooms as possible, we conceived a central kitchen-dining space that, despite being set back from the front of the house, serves as its heart. It is directly connected to the living area and the exterior terrace and also doubles as circulation that distributes towards the other rooms.

A simple gesture of raising the ceiling slightly over this central area creates a sense of spaciousness that goes beyond its actual surface. Window-glazed, this skylight turns it into a bright and ever-changing space depending on the position of the sun during the day; a sort of kaleidoscope that fills the interior with light, with its nuances and reflections. The choice of semi-gloss white finishing for the interior wood cladding enhances this dynamism further.

The rest of the program is symmetrically distributed around this main space, with two bedrooms opening up towards the sea and the roofed terrace at the front of the house, which on its part, has a natural and direct connection to the terrain.

The service and equipment area, on the other hand, are located on the south side, which is colder and exposed to the prevailing winds of the location. This area of the house is almost hermetically sealed, with the only opening being the main entrance with an airtight mudroom working as a buffer of sorts. An opaque sliding door, clad in the same wood as the rest of the façade, closes of this intermediary space, and thus the house’s entire back side. Once the door slides into its position, the façade becomes a solid plane, enigmatic and mute, and in sharp contrast to the window glazed front.

From a construction standpoint, it’s worth noting that the project was almost entirely prefabricated in a workshop: the wall panels were delivered to the site fully finished, including the installation conduits, thermal insulation, and exterior and interior cladding. While the interior finishing pine boards were installed side by side and painted in solid white, the exterior boards were arranged in such manner as to achieve a textured effect, and they were treated with a semi-transparent tint in a grayish tone that allows the house to blend with its surroundings.