Spanish studio Mesura has created a brick and concrete house that steps down a steep hill and features giant windows that frame the surrounding Mediterranean landscape.
Named Casa Dosmurs, the home is designed to blend in with its site in the residential area of Alella in Catalonia, Spain, with its flat roof the only part visible from the adjacent street.
“The house is set apart from the street and adjacent constructions by hiding between two bare walls that follow the site’s abrupt slope,” said architecture studio Mesura.
“Thus, the house disappears entirely from the street’s view.”
Casa Dosmurs comprises a spacious open-plan living and dining area, alongside two bedrooms. It is designed by Mesura to have an “honest” aesthetic, achieved using common structural materials such as brick and prefabricated concrete panels that are left exposed inside.
“Following the idea of ’honest architecture’, where we show how the house has been built, all the concrete structure is left visible,” the studio told Dezeen.
While it is concealed from view on one side, the home opens up to the sea on the other through its wide windows. The glazing extends up from the double-height living area to the mezzanine level above where the two bedrooms are found.
Connected to a private garden, the two bedrooms can be totally or partially closed off with folding wooden partitions that Mesura designed to cater for different levels of privacy, light and ventilation.
Inside, Casa Dosmurs’ internal walls are covered by bricks with vertical cuts on their surface and with varying rotations in some places for a playful finish.
Minimalist furniture is dotted throughout, with pieces by local companies including rug brand Nanimarquina and lighting brand Santa&Cole, and Barcelona-based furniture and product designer Max Enrich.
According to the studio, the home was assembled on-site in just three days thanks to the prefabricated concrete panels, which also helped minimise material waste.
“Working with a structural system made in the workshop was for three reasons,” explained Mesura.
“For the precision of its execution in the workshop, the efficiency in assembling the house on a very difficult terrain due to its slope and quality of the land, and for the reduction of material,” added the studio.
Casa Dosmurs is complete with a flat roof that acts as an open terrace overlooking the landscape.
Mesura is an architecture studio based in Barcelona that was founded in 2010 by Benjamin Iborra Wicksteed and Carlos Dimas Carmona.
Previous projects by the studio include a house extension with a scalloped roofline and a concrete and stone home bisected by an outdoor terrace.
The photography is by Maxime Delvaux.