Roxbury House / Desai Chia Architecture

The Roxbury House marries art and landscape in intimate and broad moments. The house is positioned uphill and on the edge of the 12-acre property to strategically take advantage of prevailing winds for natural ventilation and to minimize site disturbance, allowing the existing open meadow and forest to support local wildlife and native vegetation. The undulating roofs and their deep overhangs simultaneously draw in sunlight at different times of the day and frame landscape views while also reducing direct glare and solar heat gain. Rainwater management— through a series of rain gardens and retention ponds— mitigate erosion along the steep terrain.

Co'met brings together three distinct programs in a new and powerful architectural image. The Arena, the convention center, and the exhibition center come together in a spectacular sequence along the southern entrance to Orléans. The whole constitutes a vast multifunctional facility, a unique tool for sports, culture and events. By installing the functions in a way that is both distinct and continuous, Co'met drastically changes the perception of the entrance to the Orleans metropolis.

The design idea was to keep the volume but colour everything black. The owners showed us the single-family home they had just bought, on the outskirts of Sant Cugat, built in 2010, nondescript and with little aesthetic appeal; the vertical faces were exposed brick in ochre tones and all other elements featured different grey tones and finishes.

Luis Barragán’s legacy lies in the way he uses light and color. Tadao Ando's sensitive approach to natural light established his own architectural language. James Turrell's dramatic interior transformations explore a unique perception of visual experiences where "light is not a tool to enable vision but rather something to look at itself". Olafur Eliasson's immersive installations play with the psychology of viewers using just light, water, and air. These architects and designers, among others, have reimagined how light is perceived, inspiring generations of architects to follow suit with the way they understand and employ light.