Architecture Wednesday: House in Correas

This house, outside the metropolitan area of Petrópolis—which sounds like a place where Latino superheroes live—in Brazil is just the kind of place I’d need when I need to get away from it all and have that deserted island feel.

The house was designed by Rodrigo Simão Arquitetura  to be horizontal and sprawling rather than towering and tall. The intent here was to make it feel like a cozy escape, keeping everything low and nestled amongst the lush greenery in the surrounding area. And them rather than making one monstrous home, the designers created a series of outbuildings featuring separate suites for family and guests.

Inspired by Brazilian prairie houses of previous decades, it’s made of traditional stone walls, steel frames, and sits in a forested area flanked on all sides by lush gardens that provide each of the several patios a gorgeous view.

The master bedroom suite was designed for relaxation and meditation, with beautiful views when the doors are flung open; this part of the house includes a living and dining space, kitchen, home theater, and playroom—oh the games I might play…—at one end. The other bedroom suites are on the opposite side of the home, through a stunning indoor-outdoor verandah.

The dining room is perhaps the most stunning example of the intentional materiality chosen by designers, with glazed but naturally colored wood; outside is one of the verandahs, covered like a pavilion and fully equipped with its own barbecue and pizza oven.

Carlos would like a pizza oven; Carlos has never made a pizza.

The process of collecting the materials to build this house was a process, with the designers collecting local pieces of stone, reused wood, and even classic home pieces—like doors and windows—from demolitions in the area. This eccentric patchwork of materials creates a rustic chic aesthetic, as though the home is a mosaic of beautiful elements that have been pieced together over time.

Like, say, after a shipwreck? Is it wrong that I wanna play Blue Lagoon here, but with Carlos stepping in for Brooke Shields?

The home also features a fitness room under another pavilion, from which one can see a workshop and barn, the two beautiful pools with naturally running water, and even a river that has always naturally flowed through the land, passing by the gardens and adding a calming trickling sound to the whole outdoor space. And throughout the yard you’ll see the use of local stone to create paths and walkways moving in lovely patterns across and through the lush, green grass, occasionally leading to matching stone staircases that account for changes in terrain across softly sloping hills.

I so need this one.

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