The Playhouse is the latest project by Aboday Architects, situated in Bumi Serpong Damai (BSB) Tangerang. The house is an amalgamation of an existing 120 type house with a new building in its adjacent 200 sqm empty plot. Restricted by its corner setback, the building occupies only 150 sqm of the total 320 sqm land. The look is straight forward, mimicking the sloping roof of neighboring house. The material is almost bare, with dominantly exposed concrete as its main pallete, punctuated by small glass incision and opening towards the main road.

Generally, it appears as an inward orientation building with plenty of vertical green walls providing a friendly gesture to otherwise staid looking house. The house will be mostly occupied by a multi generation family of 3. There is a sculptural slider of concrete, tuck in the corner between 2 main building massing. Except for the 3 enclosed bedrooms, the rest of the house is an open space dominated by white and grey palette of exposed concrete wall and ceiling. Some flaws during the concrete pouring on the wall and ceiling left trace of ‘elements’ that become a natural ornamentation in the house.

Concrete has been chosen as main building material, simply because of its dualism quality. By having an extremely high ceiling (10 meter in height), applying a special coating of heat resistant membrane on the external roof surface and leaving external wall occupied by plenty of cripple plants (which soon will grow to the roof); it helps to reduce internal heat accumulation significantly. Here, natural ventilation and lighting play an important aspect of the house. All open spaces have no air conditioning system, and dependent entirely on the opening and incision between walls, windows and roof for fresh air ventilation generated by a series of ceiling fan suspended beneath the concrete roof using a metal rod mechanism. [Photos by Happy Lim]

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