Ocuilan de Arteaga, México
After the earthquake on September 19, 2017, Mexican architect Francisco Pardo Arquitecto designed Casa Karina, a house for the Guzmán family in the rural town of Ocuilan de Arteaga through a request by Fundación PienZa Sostenible and Love Army México.
Casa Karina won a recent 2021 Green Good Design® Award from The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies and The Chicago Athenaeum.
Seventeen months after the tragedy, PienZa Sostenible has managed more than 150 reconstruction projects in six states thanks to the support of different donors, agencies and volunteers, with the aim of improving the quality of life of people in communities that not only suffered serious effects on their heritage, but also present serious cases of vulnerability and social deprivation.
Since August 2017 until today, a total of 16 homes have been delivered in Ocuilan, State of Mexico. The project promoted by #LoveArmyMéxico, and supported by Fundación Origen ¡Échale! to your House, Fuerza México Trust and PienZa Sostenible, comprises 50 single-family homes designed by more than 40 architecture offices, as well as a Community Center, by T_O Arquitectura.
For this initiative, Francisco Pardo and his team designed a house for the Guzmán family in the rural town of Ocuilán de Arteaga.
The family land –of 4,305 ft2– where the house used to be is divided into five equal parts: one per sibling.
In their 807 ft2 plot, the Guzman’s originally had a precarious wood construction of approximately 16 x 13 feet, covered in metal sheets, without any kind of isolation, and with an attached latrine; inside, it had soil floors.
The house was inhabited by Karina, her husband Miguel Ángel, and their daughters, Annette and Alix.
The team talked with the family about the layout for their new home; they wanted to know what they needed and what would work for them.
They requested two rooms, a small living room, and a wood-burning stove outside, preferably roofed.
If they had designed a one-story house–i.e., a 527 ft2 building in a land of 807 ft2–the family would have been left without open areas. Therefore, they decided to build a two-story house, reducing the floor plan to 263 ft2 and leaving an area for planting trees.
Furthermore, this allowed the team to create a terrace on the third floor–an intimate space for the family, where they can see the town, the neighboring fields, and the surrounding volcanoes.
The conversations led to the relevance of outdoor areas: Karina cooks with firewood outside while the girls play in the field.
This is the reason why the architects contemplated the kitchen as the central axis of the house, the place from where you can see everything.
This way, while Karina is cooking, she can have a view of the field and see her daughters playing, as well as interact with her family and neighbors.
The toilet, previously attached to the house, was shared by all of the families. They sought to respect this common use, so the toilet was built as an independent facility and is now a full bathroom and a more private space.
The architects used concrete for the foundation and polished cement for the floors. Vertical reinforcements were installed in the walls–reinforced concrete slabs. Compressed earth blocks, created in situ, were used for every wall, and pinewood was used for the doors and windows.
This is how they were able to entirely adapt the design to the needs and uses of the Guzman family and to build a new and more resistant home for them, providing better space conditions.
Project: Casa Karina
Architects: Francisco Pardo Arquitecto S.C.
Design Team: Francisco Pardo, Ivan Saucedo, Karen Burkart, Daniel Castillo, Juan Gutiérrez, Jesús Manjarrez, Eréndira Navarrete, Sofía Rodríguez, Gustavo Vargas
Client: Fundación PienZa Sostenible and Love Army México
Photographers: Jaime Navarro, Pablo Astorga, Fernanda Olivares
