ShowCase: Hemeroscopium House

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For the Greek, Hemeroscopium is the place where the sun sets. An allusion to a place that exists only in our mind, in our senses, that is ever-changing and mutable, but is nonetheless real. It is delimited by the references of the horizon, by the physical limits, defined by light, and it happens in time.

Hemeroscopium house traps, a domestic space, and a distant horizon. And it does so playing a game with structures placed in an apparently unstable balance, that enclose the living spaces allowing the vision to escape. With heavy structures and big actions, disposed in a way to provoke gravity to move the space. And this way it defines the place.

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The Hemeroscopium House superexposes its massive structural grid as the driving aesthetic concept (Click on this and all of the images to get a detailed view)

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Close up of the Hemeroscopium House's structure

The order in which these structures are piled up generates a helix that sets out from a stable support, the mother beam, and develops upwards in a sequence of elements that become lighter as the structure grows, closing on a point that culminates the system of equilibrium. Seven elements in total. The design of their joints respond to their constructive nature, to their forces; and their stresses express the structural condition they have. By the way this structure is set, the house becomes aerial, light, transparent, and the space kept inside flows with life. The apparent simplicity of the structure´s joints requires in fact the development of complex calculations, due to the reinforcement, and the prestress and post-tension of the steel rods that sew the web of the beams.

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The glass facade gives the massive beam an almost floating appearance

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Close up of one of the eight main structural beams

It took us a year to engineer but only seven days to build the structure, thanks to a total prefabrication of the different elements and a perfectly coordinated rhythm of assembly. All of our effort oriented to develop the technique that would allow to create a very specific space. And thus, a new astonishing language is invented, where form disappears giving way to the naked space. Hemeroscopium house materializes the peak of its equilibrium with what in Ensamble Studio we ironically call the “G point”, a twenty ton granite stone, expression of the force of gravity and a physical counterweight to the whole structure.

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The elevated swimming pool cantilevers far into the open space

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A view inside the inner courtyard unveils the beautiful play of the giant beams and V-shaped pillars

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Elevation Sketch

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Section Sketch

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Isometric Sketch

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Model Photo - Exterior

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Model Photo - Exterior

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Model Photo - Exterior

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Model Photo - Interior

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Construction impressions

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During the 7-day construction process: bringing the prefabricated beams into position

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During the 7-day construction process: bringing the prefabricated beams into position

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During the 7-day construction process: bringing the prefabricated beams into position

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Construction impressions

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Construction progress: the main structure is complete

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Antón García- Abril with his team on one of the giant beams

Antón García- Abril

*1969 in Madrid, Spain
European Doctor of Architecture. ETSA, Madrid 2007.
Master in Architecture, ETSA Madrid 1995.
Spanish Academy research scholarship in Rome 1996.
Establishes Ensamble Studio in 2000.
Professor at the E.T.S.A. Madrid, Architecture Projects.
Writes about architecture in EL CULTURAL.
Gives lessons and conferences at different forums and universities.

2008
Exhibition JAE (Young Spanish Architects). Arquería de los Nuevos Ministerios. Madrid. (Sede SGAE Noroeste en Santiago de Compostela).
Exhibition “La natural seducción de la piedra – Contemporary Architecture in Spain. PIEDRA2008”. (Sede de la SGAE en Santiago de Compostela).
Conference “recent work” Accademia d'Architettura of Mendrisio.
Conference “Sfidando la gravità.” Facoltà di Architettura di Ferrara. Ferrara.
Conference “Sfidando la gravità.” Museo di Castelvecchio. Verona.
Conference “A young look to knowledge frontier. Subtractive architecture.” Menéndez Pelayo International University. Santander.
Honor Guest – Conference “Tuned City - Between sound and space speculation. Antón García-Abril: building for sound”. Technische Universität. Berlin.
Conference in Technische Universität Berlin. “Antón García- Abril: studio work. Positionen 08”.
Conference “Matter in time", Academic Association of Lusíada University, Lisbon.
Conference “New works”. Intention cultural program. Formatos library. A Coruña.
Visiting professor in Cornell University, Ithaca, New York.
Architectural Digest Award. Best architect of the year 2008.

2007
Conference "Antón García-Abril. Recent work". Harvard University, Massachusettts.
Visiting professor in University of Navarra, Spain.
Lecturer at the "X Architecture Courses", C.M. Hernando Colón, Seville.
Lecturer at Dallas Architecture Forum, Texas.

2006
Visiting professor in UTA - University of Texas at Dallas.

2000
First Prize. Biennial of Architecture 2000, Spanish Pavilion, Venice.

1997
Store – Exhibition HAZEN PIANOS project. Madrid. Built (1998).
Honorable mention. Madrid City Hall XIII Architecture and Town Planning Award. (Store – Exhibition HAZEN in Madrid).

Antón García-Abril Ruiz & Ensamble Studio. Madrid, 2000.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

looks cool....but the carbon footprint of this fucking thing is HUGE, probably equal to that of the entire state of Vermont.

remember

1 ton of concrete creates 1 ton of carbon dioxide.

i could design a battleship that would be better for the environment.

hyperbole undermines your critique, xcarlx.

the only carbon-neutral choice is mass suicide of humanity (see !)

i do kind of wonder why there are two pools. but the design is compelling. very nicely done.

maybe,

but you have to admit that using bridge girders to build a suburban house is ridiculous at best, arrogant at worst. given the state of the environment and the global economy, i don't think that we should be encouraging design that is blatantly as wasteful as this.
if these were salvaged from something....but i don't think that was the case.

I saw him give a lecture of this house during its construction back during the 06-07 academic year, he's got some pretty interesting (and quite labor intensive) solutions to his projects.

this house was designed and built before the economy went to crap.

there is this gray area of architectural criticism that critics are most challenged with. that is, you want to like an architectural work, write about it, yet there are also certain views that are completely negative and there are no ways to hold them back if you want to be true to yourself.

i agree with some of the commenters about the gluttony of the highly playful structural stacking, as playful as stacked wood blocks. the pronounced masculinity of the architects' beautifully dynamic composition and material choice and the wow aspect.
and, for a dwelling, no more.

however, the part bothers me has nothing to do with with these compositional, structural, dramatic and material qualities of the work. it is almost like a 'tonka toy' afternoon with the installation, and i accept that, and even throw a sympathetic minor smile.

the part i will point to has something to do with this idea of "planned genius" that i find bothersome. almost paving a way to 'wow show'. the process in this planned genius is part of the deal. that the geniusity must be recognized not because it is part of the work, it must be recognized because it is demanded by the author.
i think not, i won't give...
there is a genius on the linked freeway pass above and the reality of another nuance on the direct underpass derelict picture. as both links point to freeway construction also point to grim reality of the spanish project's decorative use of the same fabrication of the components.
sometimes these type of heroics, leave us with empty spaces as they would. we have to look at them, admire it and often see the commodified genius. a giveaway.
the tree chocked by the ivy, the only sign of life. my final picture. zoom away. pan out.

This is, wittingly or not, a post modern parody of modernist idioms (therefore, by locating industrial references at its heart, a parody of post modern idioms). A knowing monstrofication of modern architectural elements and their arrangement.

Cool for a week. Then the party will migrate to the Vatican-sized cardboard box in which it came. We will tear that mother down.
Pre-or-during-or-post-economic meltdown, still just as precious & unnecessary & cartoony.
Also, I'll never have the stretch Hummer double decker limo this behemoth necessitates. Or the teeny peeny.

I don't think that we could call this architecture. Is like if a kid plays with a model without having any sense about the scale. So there's a thing that I think that is an basic part of our work that is being coherent. Spanish architects use the materials and, in some cases are the strongest keypoints of the projects but always being coherent with a system, created by the architect to solve a problem. Here the problem, and the genius like Orhan says, is at the beginning of the process. There's no sense about the context, the place or the way of living of the ones who must live in. I can't understand a dwelling thinked like a infrastructure, a dwelling it's not only functional.

Taking as a beginning a created problem it's the best way to leave the main problems unsolved.

The design is obviously not interested in making any apologies. The designer/s know it can exist and make a valid statement, agree or disagree; it is there for the taking. It has references to previous projects but the language is a bit torpid because it is over come by the over engineering. The over engineering is interesting formally and graphically but as a place of habitat it leaves you with a very tense feeling (not just for the amount of weight above your head) because it is hard to familiarize your self with such frigid elements. The space clearly does not need people to exist in it. The space is for space sake........that is interesting but not as interesting when you have to live in it.

Firstly, I’d want to apologize to the readers and to the architect owner of this huge architectural stupid thing, but I have to say some words about this new amusing architectural concept.

As it is quoted at the beginning of the abstract text, the Hemeroscopium is a place that doesn’t exist and it should have happened the same with your hair-raising creation.

In this text it’s continued saying how the engineering development of this creepy monster took you a year and the assembly in the build-site no more than seven days. I don’t intend to hurt you but I’d want to know why you waste your time making this sickening design for a year and above all, why you have the temerity of comparing your ridiculous build to the 7 days God world creation.

I wonder if am I to blame for what you made? Or better said, if is the society to blame for architects made? You can appeal to girls or men because you could be a handsome man and you work out well on photos. Please, give up the architecture and spend your time like a cute model…!

I don´t either see the point to this building...I think it´s too pretencious and it doesn´t aim its target.
Of course it deals with some interesting facts such us prefab, games of opposites heavy/light or unstable balance...but what do we get? another glass house, and not a good one, with a patio where you can feel how far you are from the hemeroscopium you desired.
"Hemeroscopium house traps, a domestic space, and a distant horizon"...you´re right! you built the perfect cage from what you want to scape; it´s imposible that anyone there can think about this idyllic place.
This "prefabrication system" is so senseless I wonder how you convinced the owner and the constructor...funny thing, both are you?
Lightness vs heaviness it´s an old topic in architecture, you could check many examples, from Danteum to the Campo Baeza´s works, you sure know well, to see better ways to create this effect.
I´m sure you didn´t mean to play God´s role, but a structural engineer´s (and elsurfer knows how different they are)...but I´m sure this is not the way. Fortunately there´s many people doing interesting structures and buildings nowadays to lose more time with this Lego out of scale, so I won´t comment the G point nor the motorbike shelter

If I'm not mistaken, these guys are working on a high rise tower that actually stacks those super girders on top of each other in a sort of load bearing wall way (or maybe it's just as a skin). it's in the new croquis.

all carbon footprint arguments should probably be reserved for the completion of that project. not judging it, just saying it's out there.

......at least it's pre-fab?????

If there is a trapped domestic space under this pile of concrete beams, must be veeery trapped, I don't see it anywhere. Definitelly is not a house to live in, maybe an exercise in engineering, machoism, pursuing of the "G" point location. Maybe is the architect's own house ( some have a habbit of doing outrageous things, expresing their personality, provided they are loaded with money). It reminds me of a project I did at uni, trying to design a multi-unit housing block linked to a multi-laned freeway. Now wonder I did crap. I find this house uninspired and uninspiring.

Architecture should create "feelings", make people react. I suppose that is the difference between " Building" and Architecture. (Remember Zevi?)
So this building create a reaction, but it does in a subtle way, almost to clever. In the end is a "bricolage" , an assembly of structural elements
as I said cleverly done, and use ordinary structural section to create a living space. To my knowledge it has never done before, not to such extend. Does it create a reaction?Does it excite?Is it Architecture?
Or in a more intellectual manner is the the equivalent of "Caesars Palace" and "The Long Island Duckling" (ref. Learning from Las Vegas)?

i like it because it fetishizes the huge concrete beams that are common in north american cities...so it speaks to me because the absurdity of this structure/architecture also comments on our concrete cities/highway and transportation infrastructure.

it's interesting.
it gets people talking.
it's carefully constructed.
i'm glad it was built.

besides, it's better than 99% of the shit-tacular shit being "designed" and built out there.

Um, does anybody else see that the granite rock isn't actually counterbalancing the cantilever? I think its actually increasing the moment at that point. It's like that beam didn't have enough work to do keeping itself supported as half of it is cantilevered so the architect put another beam on top of it on its unsupported side and then, just for kicks, threw a massive granite block on top.

Poor, poor girder, it could have had a useful life as a highway overpass, now its a post-modern Atlas...

Hanque, I can see where you are coming from , and possibly it was the wright precedent, but this project doesn't do justice to the bordeaux house as a precedent. That one is a masterpeace for its philosophy, technicality and atmosphere. Like all epigones, Mr. Garcia-Abril doesn't compare. He might have recently received a prestigious award, but simply, in my opinion, doesn't have the intelectual finesse of the Kool guy.

extremely interesting prefab project

it is amazing that spectacular interior spaces can be created by an overhaul of our notions of traditional residential construction. there are only a few simple elements ingeniously composed. construction is efficient and highlights the significance and important call for prefab, modular design.