A courtyard and a tree in the heart of the home

On a plot between party walls in Sabadell, only six meters wide and very deep, a family has found a way of living that has little to do with excesses and much to do with daily well-being. The house, with 210 square meters over two floors, does not seek to impress. Their idea of luxury is that natural light reigns, that there is cross-ventilation, that silence dominates, and that a tree is present in most rooms.

The authors of the project, architects Llorenç Vallribera Farriol and Aleix Gil Noray, from Vallribera Noray Arquitectes, knew the owners well. They knew they didn't want a showy house, much less ostentatious, but rather a serene refuge for everyday life. A place to work, raise children, receive friends, and rest without stridency. An architecture that avoids adding superfluous things, to respond naturally to the needs of those who inhabit it.

Perhaps the easiest solution would have been to distribute the rooms one after the other. And it would have worked. But they decided to empty the center and give it a courtyard. Inspired in a way by the Cordoban courtyards and the quiet repetition of ancient cloisters, this void is truly the heart of the house.

In the middle, a tree grows. Its leaves can be seen from almost any point in the home: from the kitchen, from the sofa, from the stairs, and from the bedrooms. It is a presence that accompanies, that makes the passage of the seasons visible, and that introduces a fragment of nature into the domestic routine. An image of well-being might be having breakfast watching its leaves move or ending the day with open windows and a little fresh air coming into the house.

Changing the way of life

The courtyard also transforms the way of inhabiting. With it, all the rooms of the house have an exterior facade, as most of them are open towards this central space. Looking towards this point of nature in the heart of the home, a succession of simple windows, cheaper and less ostentatious than if large panes of glass had been chosen, multiplies the light and favors ventilation. With an awning that regulates insolation, a comfortable microclimate is created both in winter and in the hotter months. After two summers living there, there has not yet been any need to turn on the air conditioning. The energy demand is below the Passivhaus standard.

As you walk through the house, the ground floor hosts shared living: kitchen, dining room, living room – in a single space but with defined functions – as well as a study that, if necessary, could become a bedroom. At the back, a garden with a small pool is another, and a privileged, place to enjoy the outdoors. On the upper floor, the children's rooms relate to each other and have a common space that is currently a play area and tomorrow could be a study space. The master bedroom opens onto the patio, the terrace, and the garden.

The architecture also does not hide how it is built. The solid brick load-bearing walls coexist with large cross-laminated timber panels that form the ceilings and also the floor above, they are left to be seen and touched. On the ground floor, polished concrete with marble dust and underfloor heating provide comfort and thermal inertia. There are no decorative gestures in this house. Every decision seems to answer the question of what makes a house help to live better. The answer, here, is a patio, some windows, and a tree in the center of it all.