Vivere A-Metropolitano Festival

Tirana, 20.09.25

The house in Ishull is a country house, a village house rather than a holiday retreat, as one might initially assume. A retired couple lives there permanently, cultivating the surrounding land, while their children—who live elsewhere—visit regularly. The program is therefore simple but somewhat unusual: a series of rooms organized around a large living area that accommodates both everyday life and family gatherings.

The house stands on the edge of the village, surrounded by olive trees. From the lower part of the site the building remains almost hidden behind the trees, revealing itself gradually as one approaches.It is a modest courtyard house, yet spatially very generous. Much of the space is actually outside. In the warm climate of coastal Albania, life naturally extends outdoors for most of the year, and the project embraces this condition by articulating a sequence of external spaces.The architecture is generous in spatial terms, but modest in construction and cost.The house is conceived as a thick volume composed of three parts, organized around an empty core. This central void contains the swimming pool, a large stair, a shaded space beneath a bridge-like structure, and an open square in front of the house. In this sense, almost half of the house is exterior space.

This exterior space continuously shifts from covered to open, from shadow to sunlight. The large stair further transforms the perception of the courtyard by introducing changes in level. As a result, the boundaries between interior and exterior remain ambiguous. There is no strict hierarchy between rooms and open areas; everything is interconnected, offering different readings depending on where one stands.The house attempts to respond to several questions that contemporary residential architecture must confront: How can we remain local? What does sustainability mean today?

The project is sustainable in a very direct sense. It uses very few resources and consumes very little energy. Hot water and winter heating are provided by solar energy, and for most of the year the house operates with almost no energy consumption.The building was constructed almost entirely from local materials and resources. The structure is made of local concrete, using locally produced cement and steel. The walls consist of thick, single-layer hollow bricks, approximately 45 centimeters wide. Thermal insulation was achieved with a mixture of straw, lime, sand, and casein. The plaster finishes were made from sand, lime, and casein, without cement or synthetic additives.

The distinctive red color comes from iron oxide powder, incorporated into all the mixtures.Openings are of two types. Large fixed windows frame the surrounding landscape and bring abundant light into the house, while smaller operable windows provide natural ventilation.The material strategy was conceived to require as little maintenance as possible, using durable materials capable of lasting for decades.Ultimately, the architecture of the house seeks a continuous harmony between interior and exterior, a subtle game that constantly shifts the boundary between the two.This lecture is intentionally simple.Because I believe that architecture should remain honest, and should reveal clearly the way it is made.