Zarcillo

Zarcillo | San Miguel de Allende, México | 2023
[estudio ar]

Quinta Zarcillo is a project located on the outskirts of San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Designed by the architect Agustin Rocha, Zarcillo is a project open to the landscape and materially made up mainly of red brick obtained in the vicinity of the area with a finish derived from a mixture of ashlar blocks which provides visual warmth and envelopes in a natural environment.

The project is located within a vineyard on the outskirts of San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Where the main assignment was to create a house for the weekends and periodic stays which would promote disconnection from daily life but, at the same time, would promote the social encounter of the inhabitants in more than one space.

The project emerges on an irregular terrain with a ravine and slope to the west, it is uprooted and conditioned by these characteristics as well as respect for the existing vegetation, mostly medium-sized palo dulce and nopal trees. The project is made up of 4 blocks that suggest the separation of the private and the social, as well as the favoring of the passage of the wind and natural lighting, these same blocks are connected by a walkway facing east and the main façade, with a materiality change emphasizing the transition space, the rooms are moved towards the end blocks, these blocks being the tallest, and leaving the interior blocks for social spaces such as terrace and pool, doing this allows us to contain the exterior visuals towards and from the property-street relationship and allows us to turn inwards with views towards the ravine and the vineyard.

The project is created from the idea of a horseshoe-shaped fortress with clean volumes oriented towards the ravine to take advantage of the greatest number of views, adding to this it is suggested that the interior blocks be lower in height and that their roof be 4-sided, which are integrated and mixed with the background landscape and the context, and at the same time allows you to have visuals with greater breath. Text description by the architects.