On the outskirts of Madrid, amid a sea of warm brick and terra-cotta, a serrated silhouette of azure cuts across a crimped backdrop of corrugated steel. This playfully unconventional facade belongs to a house commissioned by an elderly couple newly adapting to mobility challenges. Wary of the isolation experienced by the husband’s father in an institutionalized nursing home, and increasingly struggling with the four-story, stair-riddled layout of their longtime residence, they turned to a team of architects to design a home where they could comfortably age in place.
Beyond-the-Family House is the product of a transatlantic partnership forged between New York–based Ignacio G. Galán and Madrid-based husband-and-wife duo Álvaro Martín Fidalgo and Arantza Ozaeta of OF Architects. The three met in architecture school at Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, and have stayed in close touch since. “We work on some projects together, and others we work on independently. It’s a bit like an open relationship,” says Galán with a laugh.
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