nARCHITECTS design villa for Inner Mongolia, China

This villa, designed by New York–based nARCHITECTS, led by Eric Bunge and Mimi Hoang, is part of a larger project dubbed Ordos 100. nARCHITECTS is one of 100 architects from 29 countries selected by Herzog and de Meuron to design a 1000 sq m villa in 100 days for the community of Ordos located in Inner Mongolia, China. The project is being developed for Jiang Yuan Water Engineering Ltd and is master planned by Fake Design and Ai Wei Studio in Beijing.

nARCHITECTS Villa Villa is conceived as a house within a house, with two distinct spatial and thermal conditions that respond to the extreme swings of the Ordos desert climate. The house provides its inhabitants with a variety of modes of living as they occupy a house that expands and contracts according to the seasons. The Inner House forms the domestic core. Three single storey volumes are stacked on top of each other resulting in a series of terraces on the roof of the volumes below. The first floor provides connections to the landscape and the spaces of the Outer House. Experienced in the round, the second floor’s open configuration connects views to the outside across a continuous living space. On the third floor are the sleeping quarters. The roof is designed as a fourth floor and is optimized in shape and orientation to house a photovoltaic array.

Gardens are incorporated into the Outer House rather than left exposed to the extreme climate conditions. The material, light and spatial qualities of these intermediate spaces contrast dramatically with the Inner House. While warm woods, stone and plaster line the Inner House, the materials of the Outer House are rougher: brick floor, painted brick walls on the interior and an exterior surfaced in various brick textures.

The double house configuration provides maximum living flexibility and is an energy conserving strategy for the entire house.