Salgado House at Malabe

• Architect: Kasun Lakshan Wathuyaya
• Location: Malabe, Sri Lanka
• Year: 2018
• Time Duration: 12 Months
• Client: Sajeewa Salgado & Sichni Ranaginghe
• Author: Kasun Lakshan Wathuyaya
• Photographer: Kasun Lakshan Wathuyaya

The site being located in a tight urban context the architect has opted to manipulate modern architectural principles in his design concept as to make sure that the building would adopt the tropical climate.  Taking leaves out of concepts like minimalism, simplicity, clean lines, materiality and detailing as architectural application the architect has strengthened his main concept of modernity in residential architecture creating openness with in the building as well. The simple structure and the neatness of the spaces created with in the building has made this initial design concept much more expressive through the building.

Space allocation has been a major concern in a tight urban setting where the architect has shown his capacity in creating spaces with pleasant spatial progression which flows throughout the whole building. Ensuring openness has made it much simpler and the along with neatness in space allocation has made this creation unique out of the other residential buildings. As you enter the building an entrance lobby is created as a subspace so that it will not degrade the spatial quality in the living area which is the main space of the building. This also makes sure that you have a breathing space as you enter the living space without exposing to the main space at once. The openness of the living, dining and kitchen spaces being designed connecting together has made the main space much more prominent with in the design. So that creating a subspace before entering to the core spaces has created a unique ambiance strengthening the progressiveness of the spaces that have linked together. The architectural skills have been clearly shown as to create this kind of a spatial progressing in a residential building of this smaller scale.

Considering the climatic principles in to his deign the architect has created a basic building form of a “U shape” to make it sure that there would be minimal climatic concerns as a building which exposes to a tropical climate. Orientation of this building has been done so that the direct sunlight will be filtered into the spaces inside and it will minimize the effect of direct glare into the building. The void which was created by the U shaped building form has been used as the swimming pool which is designed as the key element of the design. The other spaces of the house have been spun around the swimming pool making this the heart of the design. This has been created so that it is visible to all the other spaces of the house. Similarly, the main space the living area directly opens out to the swimming pool creating a soothing atmosphere connecting both inside and outside. External and internal spatial relationship has been strengthened by this space allocation. Considering stack effect as a practical implementation this space allocation has ensured the internal thermal comfort as the swimming pool will facilitate evaporative cooling to the inside spaces.

Daylight integration as well as embracing natural ventilation into the house was purely done by the usage of large openings. Even though the windows are being comparatively large the architect has intentionally reduced the thickness of the window sashes to create internal and external penetration much more effective as it reduces visual barriers. The design plays with the solid void segregation quite effectively as it opens out to the swimming pool from one side as the other opens out towards the garden. This space allocation has made sure that the house will be fully naturally ventilated as the architect has thought of generating cross ventilation through his design. The front façade of the house opens out to the garden as it brings daylight in to the house.

The architectural language of the house highlighting the details and materiality express the simplicity of the structure much more. Key elements like the swimming pool, living back feature wall, elemental pantry in the kitchen, ornamental furniture, luminaries and the artworks have made the spaces unique and lifted the quality of the whole house as a building.

Grey color has been used by the architect to paint the whole house. This was also done as the architect thought of reducing the internal reflection of light during daytime. If not the vast open spaces created with in the house with huge openings would have been uncomfortable for the users due to excess intake of daylight. This is a fact that shows the architectural implementation in the design has been utilized to gain maximum productivity in the building. This thought of the architect has made the internal spaces much soothing to the naked eye during the daytime. The other colors that have been used inside are brown and black for interior details which makes the color palate used inside to blend as in a painting considering the whole building as a single creation.

Timber variations have been used for the features and the flooring in some areas. However, this option was suggested by the client it was used by the architect so that it will blend with the material pallet of the building.

Creating a cement panel wall as the exterior wall which will look alike the fair face concrete finish has been done implementing simple lines and textures to create modern featuring in to the building.

All in all, the simple architectural implementation like space allocation, spatial progression, material usage and architectural detailing has made this house much more simple from its outlook but glamorous. The architects’ involvement and the thinking pattern on how a residential building has to be designed over a small plot is clearly shown in this creation.