Modern Santa Elena Vacation House by Antonio Sofan

Bamboo Boxes Pattern Ceiling Santa Helena House by Antonio Sofan

Santa Elena is a rural farming area with scenic, fresh air place of cool temperatures in Colombia. Antonio Sofan exploits the site to build a vacation house or weekend retreat. He manages the natural landscape to take the main role and make a discrete opening roof deck as facade entry, emphasized by a pink mosaic wall. As the roof deck folds down in sections stopping at different heights the scenery façade gets generated framing different views along a linear circulation path.

Opening Roof Deck Entrance Santa Helena House by Antonio Sofan

The house features two bedrooms, two bathrooms, small kitchen and meditation room. All of these spaces are linearly arranged and threaded by a circulation facing the view. Both bathrooms are at each end so the light coming through is regulated by a pattern of openings with glass block.

Minimalist Bedroom Santa Elena House by Antonio Sofan

By using right material, such as cork plank flooring help maintain the heat captured during the day. The house is roofed with a waterproofed very thin and slightly sloped concrete slab. Disposable bamboo boxes were arranged on a brick pattern and used to form the underside of the slab while it was being poured. That is a very traditional method of casting concrete in the area while it provided an incredible ceiling texture.

Dynamic Bathroom Interior Santa Elena House by Antonio Sofan

Interior details are very simple. All walls inside are painted white and the ceiling is painted a very light shade of cool gray. Doors are flush to the walls creating a monolithic impression. The bathrooms needed to express dynamism and movement as well. Their walls are tiled with white and three shades of blue glass mosaic creating a pattern of tiers running in the same direction with all the rest of the materials. The same effect is reinforced with the narrow mirror glass which folds up to the ceiling. Four blocks of end grain cut teak make the top of the wall hung vanity on which a vessel sink rests leaving cleanable floor space underneath. The shower and bath glass sliding doors are silk screened with a digital photograph of a water splash.