A residence for a horse breeder in Minorca

The island of Minorca situated in the Centre of the Mediterranean sea, 400 kilometers from Spain, France and Africa offers a symbolic view of the Mediterranean spot that extends luxuriously on the earth seeming to grow straight out of the sea.

The house is situated on a hill in a part of the island less concerned with tourism, surrounded by 20 acres of pasturage on which the owners breed their horses. You can find the sea 10 kilometers away whilst the nearest village is only more than a kilometer away. Just coming in from the countryside the building appears as a white spot that pops out of the green, but then approaching the building on the hill, it becomes solid with the appearance of an old fort, an idea that inspires, urging one to face the oncoming wind from the sea, with its “mares” covered wall, the local tuff, a building material that strongly characterizes its internal construction,

The project evokes the language of local architecture revisiting in a contemporary key a series of traditional elements. The internal space even though heavily influenced by local architecture, is structured as to take into account a contemporary style of life. On the ground floor space is large and free, featuring stone pillars which support lowered load-bearing arches on which lean the first floor slab. The windows are not simply wall openings but frames that establish a small visual relationship between interior spaces and the surrounding scenery.

The “mares” stone, the local ceramic and wood strongly dominate the living room, dining room and kitchen situated on the ground floor. The staircase leading to the first floor is almost a piece of sculpture featuring as one of flexibility which is a result of its stone covering but at the same time one of a trick of shadow defined by the very light penetrating through the large half-mooned window of the upper floor.

On the first floor can be found the bedrooms and bathrooms scattered around a central patio from which it is possible to admire the surrounding countryside with its green brown colours of this Mediterranean spot and in the distance, the blue of the sea.