Architect Daniel Isern designed the Meriterrani 32 house, built in
San Pol de Mar, Spain.
As the architect notes, agreeing with Claude Monet: the landscape cannot exist on its own, its appearance, environment, atmosphere, lighting are constantly changing. It is only the environment that gives objects their real value.
The project of this house started with a very difficult task: building on a very steep plot of land with a slope of almost 100%, but with a great perspective view and a rather limited budget.
It was this hard-to-reach piece of land, surrounded by a pine forest, that determined the main idea of this project. The landscape, its perspectives, the color of the trees, the movement of the sun and the shadows are constantly changing over time...
On the one hand, the limited size of the site and its complex orography, and on the other hand, the desire to leave a minimal imprint on the landscape, led us to the idea of looking for inserts into it, so that the surrounding trees, whose trunks are well attached to the ground, open the view and fit into each floor in such a way that each crown became a terrace of the next upper level and a porch for the lower one.
This resulted in a very formal structure with huge cantilevers projecting into the void and into the depths of the forest and sea. A structure that opens up to the eye and the sun, thanks to terraces and verandas, intertwines and unites the interior with the exterior.
The building is equally formal and harmonious in its volumes and the materials used for its construction. Concrete, iron, wood and stone lines, united, emphasize the character of each of them.
As a result, the whole building is a dialogue between emptiness and fullness, materials, external and internal; finding a balance between these contrasting parts.
