Ten Houses

TEN HOUSES

Type: Residential – House
Scale: 8000 sqm

In the face of a site located in the northwestern foothills of Iran—characterized by a dual climate (harsh summers and severe winters) and surrounded by rocky mountains—our primary challenge transcended the mere design of ten residential units.

The issue was to forge a collective identity from ten independent components, ensuring that the autonomy of no single unit was compromised.

We decided to cast a fresh gaze upon the project’s context. We perceived the mountain as a massive object that had obscured the visibility of smaller objects, such as stones. By mentally shifting the “background,” we detached these stones from their context, allowing them to be perceived as independent “objects.” Consequently, each house is a “hewn cube”; a stone abstracted into a cube, or a cube yearning to become stone.

The structure of each house is founded on a triad: the “Interior,” the “Skin,” and the most vital part, the “In-between.” Here, the In-between is no longer a simple filter or a buffer for climatic moderation, but a “Third Element” and a potent living realm. This space facilitates the exchange between the security of the interior and the vastness of the exterior, channeling life into a secure layer amidst these two poles. Ten Houses is an experience of dwelling on the border between geometric abstraction and the harsh reality of nature.

HAJIZADEHs
Architecture: Kourosh Hajizadeh – Amir Hossein Hajizadeh – Shervin Khoddami – Mineh Mirzakhanian – Soheil Jamali
Visualization: Pejman Taremi
Structure: Razzaghi & Assiciates
Technical Manager: Kaveh Khajuyee
Model: Mohammad Hossein Saghafi Far – Amir Reza Farahani
Model Photos: Amir Hossein Hajizadeh

Location: Tabriz, Iran
Date: 2023