Casa Tumán

Type

Client

Location

Year

Collaborators

Private

Tumán, Chile

2017

Nicolas Saieh (photography)


Casa Tumán is a private villa in the central coastal region of Chile built primarily with locally sourced materials. And for the large part with our own hands. After translating our ideas for the house into a design plan we headed off to Chile, rolled up our sleeves and joined two other builders to get our hands dirty.

The layout of this tailor-made surfer’s holiday home, was inspired by the way independent rooms were linked by a shared courtyard or balcony in traditional colonial farmhouses. The small floor plan of Casa Tumán is laid out in 6 modules: four bedrooms, one bathroom and a kitchen. Each living space has direct access to a generous roofed terrace with a magnificent view of the sea – an open air living room.

The post-and-beam wooden construction with straw bale infill walls and clay-plaster provides high insulation value and breathability. Plaster regulates humidity, the straw bale acts as a passive solar heating and sound insulation, and the windows and door openings take care of the cross ventilation.

↑ A majority of the materials are sourced from within a radius of 4 km
↑ The low volume and sloping roof makes the building less visible from the hills above and protects against the strong afternoon sun.