Vitra House

© Felipe Trucco, Josefina Valdés

© Felipe Trucco, Josefina Valdés

Architect:   Ramón Valdés

Collaborator:   A-cero Architecture Office

General Contractor:   GHG S.A.

Location:   Narciso Goycolea Nº3955, Vitacura, Santiago

Site Area:    480 m2

Built Area:   384 m2 plus basement

Project Year:   2009

Photographs:   Felipe Trucco, Josefina Valdés

In a small place we had to create a building for Vitra furniture exhibition, an international design brand and manufacture of home and office furniture. In keeping with the style of Vitra products, the building had to be original, timeless and with an architecture based on the items to display, so they appear with a relevant position and can be changed or moved in an easy and flexible way.

The area where Exhibition Hall-Showroom is located, still maintains a scale of traditional neighborhood of Vitacura and an increasing cultural offer. However, given the possibility of future constructions in height in the sector, this project was thought from the perspective that both types must be complementary and coexist harmoniously.

As the law, the norm used was not used in a dense aspect, in a way to obtain the maximum constructability in a two floor building with a five meter garden for both streets, fulfilling the regulation. The result is a perfectly modulated cube, where the windows are small to stimulate the entrance from one side and protect from the west sun.

Formally, the volume of 15 x 12 mts and 8 mts of height display in two free floors that are related with a central staircase by a perforated wooden laminated wall, which forms the first floor reception and at the same time is the handrail for the second floor. This gives a complete free surface that was required for the room without and over design, so common in this type of projects.

The work related to develop architecture and interior design projects is done in the second floor using Vitra organization systems.

The primary structure of the building is composed of columns and beams of 43 x 14 cms of laminated wood, that can be complete recuperated, and form the plates, over the beams in both floors.

The horizontal bracing consist in a separate and independent partition of wooden structure with an inner diagonal metal, which united to the primary structure by metal connectors make the structure solidary with each part.

The outer shell, also a double laminated pine board, has a rough finish, which was impregnated with a gray-green color that reveals the aging of the wood.

Pine wood was chosen as the predominant material because is a natural resource of our country, renewable, clean and environmental friendly that has all the goals we wanted to achieved: quality, gracefulness and agility for a four month building plan.

The internal structure of wood and other material, were a great concern from the beginning, because they make the final look of the building. The wood with traslucent white impregnate, the perimeter wall and the concrete floor painted in white, contributes to a neutral atmosphere, which highlights the setting of the brand.

All the metal fittings, special semicircular perforated air ducts and the electrical canalization in trays that crosses all the surface of the ceiling, were left suspended in the beams, totally at sight, the same was done with aluminums.