Spanish architects Ricardo Bofill Taller De Arquitectura created a summer home design with a splashy feature indeed – the red pool that is an instant centerpiece. This family home is located in Mont-ras, near Spanish Costa Brava – a hilly landscape of fragrant orchards which serves as the stunning inspiration for this modern pool house plan. This ravishing red outdoor entertaining area sits at the heart of a sunken courtyard, surrounded by perfectly manicured gardens and sculpted trees, overlooked by the brown brick exterior home organized around it.
A cascading set of steps leads down toward this amazing water feature, encircled by a wide deck area that invites living and lounging in the sun.
The house was actually designed and built round the existing vegetation, which becomes as much a part of the design as the architecture itself. Interiors, partially obscured by the plant life, open to this ruby colored gem.
The villa takes shape as a series of volumes projecting toward this sunny center of the universe (in this house, as least!).
Steps leading up and down, terraces at varying levels, windbreaks and walls surrounding private gardens, and the house itself combine to form a complex, interesting house plan that wants to be explored.
Every angle offers a different eye-full – equally enthralling as the last.
Only when the sun sets and the lights come on do the interiors emerge from among the trees.
The main dining room occupies this hidden, sunken outdoor room, wrapped in this crimson tiles, always open to the red pool and patio, always inviting living, lounging and laughter. The dining area is connected to the kitchen and servants’ quarters by a revolving glass door.
With a cool pool bathed in this hotter-than-hot hue, it’s easy to get distracted, but the house itself is nothing short of spectacular.
The main house is composed of two identical, three-level volumes featuring a living room with a fireplace feature at a diagonal, covered by a Catalan vault, music room, and master bedroom with bath and walk-in closet; a library on the second floor; and a playroom and sitting area on the third level
The two volumes are connected to the swimming pool via the exterior stairs.
According to Ricardo Bofill Taller De Arquitectura, “The scenographic effect of the whole is enhanced by the insertion of cypresses. An obelisk built of pink bricks (an allusion to a petrified nature) and the shape of the windows, which play on the perspective offered both by the interior and the exterior, act as counterpoints to the trees.”
The independent volumes on the property, measuring 3 by 6 by 6 meters, house additional bedrooms for family and guests, each also equipped with a bathroom and walk-in closet.
Interiors boast a cool, cave-like effect, with gaping spaces stretching from the sunken floor, up two storeys to a plastered dome ceiling overhead. An open loft encircles the second floor, looking down onto the living room below.
Follow the gold railing up the winding staircase to the upper floor.
The second floor features this open loft design, enclosed only by the handrail, enhancing the home’s wonderful, open sense of space.
A curved glass wall encloses the solarium – a sweet spot to soak up some sun without ever leaving the comfort of home.
The architects explain, “The entire house, including the swimming pool, is built on a platform, clearly reminiscent of the stylobate of a Greek temple or of Mies van der Rohe’s Barcelona Pavilion.”
Ricardo Bofill Taller De Arquitectura
