Casa Selva
The project provides affordable rents for the workers of the local hotel and restaurant industries, who are currently being displaced due to a surge in the cost of housing. The design, comprising 200 apartments, common areas, gardens, and retail spaces is compact and efficient while retaining a certain monumentality.
In a parcel of jungle at the edge of the village of Tulum, a series of four-storey blocks are organized in an interlocking comb-like configuration, spaced by a network of continuous courtyards. All open spaces in the masterplan retain their existing tropical vegetation, made up of native palm and deciduous trees, which buffer the units from each other and the project from the road.
The massing and color of the buildings are designed to work with the dappled light filtering through the forest canopy, diminishing the presence of the buildings and creating an intimate atmosphere. Lining the buildings, circulation corridors are protected by a porous screen reminiscent of the brise soleils of early brutalism, but with a finer scale and artisanal finish. Inside the apartments, each dwelling is a simple tube of space that puts the dweller in contact with nature.
The organization of the project is an innovative hybrid between modern open block urbanism and traditional courtyard building, allowing for a heightened sense of privacy, as well as crossed ventilation, within what is otherwise a fairly high-density housing project. In the ground floor, all garden-courtyards are linked by pedestrian walkways, connecting a series of public spaces for work, exercise and relaxation. In the rooftop, a swimming pool offers a moment of release and a unique experience of the tropical forest canopy.
