Project: House-Studio
Architects: inN arquitectura
Location: Huelva, Spain
Year: 2023
Photographs by: Manolo Espaliú
House-Studio by inN arquitectura
The House-Studio in Galaroza, Spain, designed by inN arquitectura, is a renovation project of La Posada, the oldest house in the town. The architects transformed the historic building into a space that combines living and working areas while maintaining the duality between the two. The diverse spatiality of La Posada provided a rich canvas for exploration, with different rooms and levels serving various purposes. The rehabilitation process took five years, during which every decision was made with care and precision. Sustainability was a key consideration, with the reuse of materials such as slabs, stones, clay tiles, and wooden paneling, resulting in an authentic and environmentally conscious design.
It is vox populi that La Posada is the oldest house in Galaroza, but no one knows its actual age. In 2012 it was the location chosen by inN arquitectura for its study and residence, thus beginning the most recent stage in the centenary history of this rural house.
When it comes to architects, a space in which to live and work moves to a reflection on the processes behind the creative and the everyday, as well as the transfers between the two, at all times we wanted to avoid caesuras, although the duality was clear, we opted for ambiguous spaces in the areas of tangency. In the plan, the work areas, with a transversal orientation, intersect with the domestic ones, clearly longitudinal, due to their orientation to the corral.
For this purpose, La Posada turns out to be the ideal continent. Its diverse spatiality, from the darkness of the cellar to the naked materiality of the upper floor, is the raw material for exploration and discovery. Finding a use for all its spaces led to a reflection on the creative process, both in its automatisms and its states of mind. In an exercise of introspection, the steps that go from the communication of the order to the presentation of results are broken down. Including the always healthy practice of a bearable occupation that entertains the mind, in this case, horticulture. And among all this, present and tenacious, life is woven. Again La Posada gives us the cue. A luminous corral vigorously attracts the residential rooms. Here it is a transversal reading of the house that opens spaces looking for a long-awaited encounter.
The rehabilitation of La Posada took five years, a long process in which each decision resulted from care and precision. There was no surface that a human hand did not pass through at this time. As if it were a great careening, entire sections of slabs were removed, their elements collected, reviewed, selected, and repositioned. Everything of value was reused where it was most helpful.
We cannot fail to emphasize that the most sustainable material is the one that is not used. Here, not only slabs were recovered. Demolition stones were used to regrow the gable end or the corral wall, clay tiles to pave the corral, block bricks to repair the bread oven and the roofs still retain their old tile cured with sun and rain. Even the passage doors were used for furniture. Wood, ceramic tiles, and manual clay tiles stand out among the contribution materials. The repair of the walls of the upper floor was made with lime mortar and its pavement is a continuous clay floor. The profuse wooden paneling, made by the Galaroza carpenters, only furthers the path of authenticity.
