Mo(u)ld House

Location: Cádiz, Spain

Client: Thomas Haynes
Date: 2017 Completion
Total Area: 401m²
Budget: Undisclosed

Team credits:

Partner in Charge: Alejandro Zaera-Polo

Project Architect: Miquel Surinyac

Team:

Alejandro Zaera-Polo, Maider Llaguno-Munitxa, Ivaylo Nachev, Blanca Munoz

“Living, forming spheres and thinking are different ways to say the same”

Peter Sloterdijk

The Mo(u)ld House is an experiment which has been under construction since 2011 and will probably continue to grow for a few more years. Conceived originally as a foam of intersecting bubbles/caves containing the different spaces of its domestic program, it was designed for a space-age caveman.

Every room was conceived as independent of the others yet interconnected, following a diagram of adjacencies and weighted attractions. Environmental stresses, views and the pressure of surrounding bubble/caves shaped the final form, making each bubble/cave unique.

A high resistance waterproof inflatable balloon was used as a lost mold to shape the reinforced concrete vaults. The insulation layer was sprayed on it to stabilize the inflatable membrane and the concrete layer sprayed onto it to form the membrane.

Trying to make the house a part of the ground, a layer of local moss, lichens, fungi and other draught-resistant, non-vascular plants has been cultivated on the dome surface to cover it with a resilient layer of living matter.