Maison Le Volet

Renovation and interior design in Paseo Sagasta, Zaragoza

Maison Le Voilet is a project resulting from the working relationship between Cronotopos and Venezia Renovazion, which started seven years ago, being this project the third office we designed for this group. This reflects our mutual growth over the years and we are delighted to have been able to contribute a part of ourselves.

Client: Venice Renovazion
Surface area: 148 m2
Status: Completed
Timeline: 2020
Location: Zaragoza

At the architectural level, this is a project with a certain eclecticism, where conceptual and spatial clarity, typical of its intended use as a workplace, is combined with different references from Zaragoza, Paris and Stockholm. Places rooted in the customer’s history and that enhance the company’s philosophy.
One of the challenges of this design was to combine this Scandinavian style, characterized by the use of raw wood, with a Haussmannian style, represented in the blue tones chosen, the flooring of reclaimed wood planks painted white and the moldings reinterpreted with a more minimalist language. All of this is contained in one of the most symbolic buildings in Zaragoza.

Conceptually, the project is divided into a public and a private part. The public area is subdivided into four rooms, connected by visuals, diagonals and different densities of furniture. As a starting point and axis of the project, the existing structure was used to generate a cross that subdivides the space, which together with the furniture and the characteristic wooden slats, helps us to generate privacy in each room despite the fact that they are interconnected. However, the private area has a more recognizable office character, although with the aim of designing fluid spaces, such as through bathrooms that separate different offices.

The energy strategy appears from the beginning with a ducted aerothermal system supported by a heat recovery system and a comprehensive reform of the thermal envelope, through the incorporation of triple glazed windows. The entire supply and exhaust ventilation system is integrated into a horizontal pit located at the junction between ceilings and walls.

The key at Maison le Voilet was to make the work come alive. The more we explored the current state, the more surprises appeared, having to adapt to each process, putting that emphasis on the delicacy of the constructive detail that we love so much.

The existing structure was stripped in order to maintain the brutality of the pre-existing materials such as concrete and steel, as well as to adapt the existing sewers and joints, integrating indirect lighting to the new elements that emerged in the evolutionary process of the project. This brutalism is also reflected in the new materials introduced. The wooden slats consist of three-layer formwork boards placed rough with a water-based varnish treatment, as if it were a direct transfer from the tree to the construction site.