Functionally, the house designed by BEIRA Arquitectura retains the original three-aisled layout. The double-height central aisle acts as a hinge, articulating the interior spaces and extending outwards, reinforcing the connection between inside and outside while organizing the house's functionality.
The materiality is achieved through the reconstruction of the original walls using a screened structure and exposed concrete block walls, which serve structural, partition, and enclosure functions. Externally, the building's volume is expressed through three repeated roofs, complemented by wooden surrounds that evoke the original stone elements, establishing, once again, a fluid dialogue between past and present.
Mundo House by BEIRA Arquitectura. Photograph by Luis Díaz Díaz.
Project description by BEIRA Arquitectura
Casa Mundo, near Santiago de Compostela, reinterprets the traditional Galician house.
The original building was heavily deteriorated. Its stone walls had endured decades of weather and time. Despite the intention to preserve it, physical and economic constraints allowed only select elements to remain.
The design strategy respects the original typology while reinterpreting it. The essence of traditional architecture is preserved—not in material, but in its constructive and spatial logic.
The three-nave layout is maintained. The central nave, double-height, organizes interior spaces and extends outward, blurring the boundary between living room and garden. It functions as a large, living, and distributing space.
Remnants of the old walls are reconstructed with a structural frame and an exposed concrete block wall, restoring the role of multifunctional material: structure, division, and enclosure—just as stone did originally, and concrete does now in different forms.
The exterior volumetry reveals the three naves through repeated roofs. Timber frames echo the old stone frames, long since lost.
