smallprojects

louvrebox house

three storey bungalow.

The louvrebox house was built
on the narrowest lot of a gated
community, a louvred box of
eighty feet and sixteen wide
lifted off an open ground floor
‘room’ created by its boundary
walls and a seven foot wide
lap pool along the garden side
left over on the south edge.

Whereas traditional houses in
various parts of Malaysia are
held off the ground by timber
columns to avoid floodwaters,
allowing ventilation and space
beneath for the mending of
nets and drying of boats and
fish, the louvrebox house uses
its undercroft as a place for
dining and domestic living.
With louvres bringing shade
and privacy to sleep above
and a ground floor below used
from garden wall to wall, the
house poses fresh uses for a
form sensitive to its origins.