Table of contents for Volume 3 in BluPrint

A home is defined not by the walls or columns that hold it up, but by the people living within it. As Winston Churchill famously proclaimed, “We shape our buildings; thereafter, they shape us.” If anyone could lend credence to that statement, it would be the inhabitants of the G House, as the structure they helped create has not only shaped their lifestyle but also their frame of mind. Working in the advertising industry, the owners used to be in a relentless state of hurry. They were always out of the house and when they were home, constantly made plans to travel or eat out. Living in the G House, a Bauhaus-inspired abode completed in 2018, reshaped their mindset. “More than any other home we’ve lived in, this makes us…

Most architects would find it blasphemous to redesign the work of someone they revere. The thought plagued Rebecca Plaza, managing director of Plaza+Partners, when she was asked to renovate a 50-year old house by Philippine National Artist Leandro Locsin. “When I was a kid, I lived on the 6th floor of the Legaspi Towers, and my room faced the Cultural Center of the Philippines,” she says. The monumentality and simplicity of the iconic brutalist building awed the young Plaza and inspired her to study the maestro in school and in her professional practice. What placated Plaza’s doubts about touching her idol’s work was the opportunity to make it last another generation. The house looked every bit its age, which did not incline the young client to save it at first.…

Yupangco began tinkering with the idea of designing a round house for himself around the time that he let go of his studio space and decided to work from home. The round house had to be a ‘fasthouse’—one that could built quickly and economically, and a house manageable for one or two people only, with or without domestic help. In addition, Yupangco wanted it to fit in an 8-by-8-square meter lot. When the team from Magis first came to visit him, they saw an early model of the O House and expressed an interest in it. Yupangco developed the design further, and describes the design concept this way. “The O House expounds on the idea of seamlessly bridging the home with its natural environment. With diminishing resources in property development…

The bathroom is an integral part in every living area where design speaks volumes about personal taste. For Villeroy & Boch, their Finion collection is all about the marriage of elegant design and technology, giving you a smarter bathroom space. The Finion collection spans the entire bathroom, from the washbasin, watercloset, bath, and other furnishings. Its purist design features and ceramic innovations–such as their washbasin’s TitanCeram technology for its slim yet strong walls and the watercloset’s CeramicPlus technology that makes it durable and quick to clean–are recognized by the international community with the prestigious iF Design Award. Apart from its sleek design, the Finion collection includes ease-of-life technological features such as a wireless smartphone charging station in the cabinets, and an integrated, high-quality Bluetooth sound system in the mirrors. This…

1 Locsin’s original design enjoyed an open driveway, a common practice in pre-1980s gated subdivisions in the Philippines. Note how the steep pitched roof, a recognizable Locsin element, is supported by cantilevered beams. The beams provide a stacatto beat against the legatto of the robust adobe wall. 2 The original door was a wooden lattice affarir backed by mirrors. 3 View of the west wing from the deck 4 A large glass chandelier hung over the original living room, shedding light on the false balcony. The original living room space was smaller, with glass doors separating it from the lanai and the swimming pool. 5 Past the covered deck was a sloping garden whose soil often eroded and muddied up the deck and pool area during rainy weather. Plaza had…

Ed Calma is one of the country’s best Modernist architects. He designed Steel to be constructed using tiles, paneling, and other parts in commercially available cut sizes. Because Magis won’t have to size the materials, and there will be zero scraps and wastage. Steel offers an endless line of permutations for the cladding. “If you want to cover it with tiles, you may. If you’re going to cover it with glass, the eaves stretch out so you’ll still be protected from the sun. If you want privacy, you can enclose it, or you can use slats. This model may be expanded in modules, horizontally or vertically,” says Cariño. The base model starts with three bedrooms and three bathrooms, with options to have up to five bedrooms and up to four…

LarioisaplayontheSpanishword, ladrillo, which means ‘brick.’ When Galicia was asked to design a Magis Home, he thought of exploring the archetype of a Filipino house – the bahay-na-bato —since there was no specific client to inform his design. He came upon the idea of playing with walls of brick, “a solid material capable of becoming transparent.” He enthuses: “There is something magical about that duality, which I find perfectly appropriate for our climate.” By day, the outer brick wall masks and protects the interior from the elements, the way a brise soleil would. It is climatically responsive. The material itself breathes and the openings in the wall allow air to cross through the house. The interior glass panels are operable and may be left all open all day and all night,…

One feels wholly unwelcome walking down this street in Barangay Don Manuel in Quezon City. Tall, fortress-like concrete walls topped by barbed wire and electrified barriers line both sides of the road, protecting unseen houses from prying eyes and intruders. Driveways and drop-offs are invisible, hidden behind heavy-duty steel gates. Trees and plants are almost nonexistent. There is the occasional clump of weeds growing out of a crack between the sidewalk and the street, and the electric posts that interrupt one’s path on the pavement. Judging from the cars that come out of the gates, the neighborhood is well to do. And based on the roofs and the second or third-story façades peering over their concrete face shields, the predominant architecture in the area is contemporary Mediterranean and Chinese. The…

Sukendro“Kendro” Priyoso and Jeffry Sandy, principals of Indonesian architecture studio Nataneka Arsitek, are not fans of the color white. Looking at the studio portfolio and visiting two of their projects makes this clear. “I’ve gotten a lot of feedback about how my projects tend to be dark in color and texture. It is both personal preference and an effect of our studio’s practice to often leave the materials we use unpainted and natural,” Priyoso says. This tactile character of Nataneka houses is no more evident than in Courtyard House in West Jakarta, whose dark, quiet presence recedes with a six-meter setback from a street of sundry two-storey houses. Immediately apparent from outside is the dialogue between the materials and extruded forms at play in the house’s front façade and gate.…

Vertical steel mullions form a veil shading the house from excessive tropical sunlight. The veil of square tubular steel lets air through to the house and allows residents to look out while preventing people outside from seeing in. The placement of the mullions is denser at the top and gradually loosens with each descending tier, creating a gradation of light and shadow inside the house. The metal veil was made to rust to give the appearance of warm brown wood draped over the coolness of the raw concrete structure. The house may be completely draped on all sides or only halfway through, as pictured in the rendering. The use of raw materials makes the home low-maintenance and invites the owners to enjoy its changing hues over time. The Veil House…

“The idea is a box within a shed—a house within a shed. When you think about it, the Philippines is a tropical country, and you need an umbrella to protect your house from the weather!” Tina Periquet (the sister of Paolo Periquet) explains the concept behind Aldo. “If you integrate the umbrella with the house, you run the risk of the heat penetrating right through. Then you have to shield the house with all sorts of insulating layers against the heat. In rainy weather, you might get some leaks because one is really attached to the other and any problem on the outer shell will, in the end, penetrate to the core. So they need to be separated too! And the in-between space, which is needed for air to flow…