A Minimal Facade and an Intimate Universe | Lorena House's by Workshop, design and construction
- Arq. Luisa Afanador
- Dec 24, 2025
- 5 min read
Author: Luisa Afanador
A restless mind about the city
ARCHITECTS: Workshop, Design and Construction.
PHOTOGRAPHY: Manolo R. Solís.
LOCATION: Mérida, Mexico.
YEAR: 2022.
M2: 125m2.
Empty in order to inhabit
In a city where the sun is relentless and colonial streets whisper stories frozen in time, there is a house that doesn't impose itself, doesn't shout, doesn't stand out. A mere 4.5 meters of facade that seems to whisper more than reveal. Those who pass by, however, don't enter a space: they enter a rhythm. A form of silence. A way of inhabiting where emptiness is architectural material.
Lorena House's isn't built on emptiness: it embraces it, structures it, and transforms it into the living heart of the project. Here, architecture isn't defined by what is built, but by what remains unbuilt. It's in that intermediate space—the patio, the respite, the light that falls unbidden—where everything happens. In this house, what is left undone is what is most palpable.
Before becoming what it is today, Casa Lorena was part of an early 20th-century mansion. Over time, and due to urban development, the land was subdivided until it was reduced to a quarter of its original size. What was once spacious and colonial was now a narrow, deep plot of land, squeezed between party walls.
The architects at Workshop, Design and Construction decided not to erase, but to reveal. Not to deny history, but to reinterpret it. The Decauville beams, still standing firm high above, were not replaced; they were restored and their value highlighted. The Marseille-style roof tiles that had withstood the test of time were reused. The exposed masonry walls were preserved.
Instead of imposing modernity, the project opts for respect. Every scar on the site becomes part of its identity. Thus, the pre-existing is not an obstacle, but a support. It is not ruin, but memory.
Casa Lorena occupies a built area of approximately 125 m², distributed along a narrow and deep plot, typical of Mérida's historic center. The house is organized into two main wings: one restored, which retains its original volume with load-bearing masonry walls, and another completely new, built of concrete and cement blocks, which responds with a contemporary architectural language to the program's needs.
The complex is organized around a central courtyard that serves as its climatic, visual, and functional hub. The program includes a double-height living room, a kitchen-dining room with direct access to the garden, two bedrooms (one on the ground floor), two bathrooms, an outdoor terrace, and a small swimming pool that extends from the central void. The circulation is linear but fragmented by visual breaks, interstitial gardens, and light wells, ensuring that the interior movement always feels in dialogue with the exterior.
The house as an interior landscape
If in modern architecture the exterior was the horizon, in Casa Lorena the horizon folds inwards. There are no large openings to the street. There is no need for them. Everything necessary is inside: light, shadow, vegetation, water, air. It is a closed universe that opens vertically and breathes horizontally.
The patio, far from being an accessory, is the structural element that organizes the living space. Everything revolves around it. From the living room with its soaring ceilings to the kitchen with its glass doors, from the floating staircase to the bedroom that boldly overlooks the view, everything is articulated around what was left unbuilt. Emptiness, here, is both form and function.
In the words of Luis Barragán, “serenity is the greatest emotion that architecture can evoke .” Casa Lorena embodies this teaching and makes it tangible: in the rustling of leaves, in the reflection of water against the wall, in the silence that accompanies the shadows. We could also recall Álvaro Siza, who stated that “architecture is not the object, but the emptiness that surrounds it .” Lorena understands this well: its beauty lies not in its walls, but in the way it allows light to filter through them.
And yet, it is not a static house. As in the work of Glenn Murcutt, here the spaces breathe. The openings allow for cross-ventilation; the materials are honest, without embellishment. The house is built with just what is necessary, and that is what allows it to achieve a greater level of depth. It is an architecture that does not impose, but accompanies. That does not close off, but filters.
Composing with silence
Some houses speak. Others, like Lorena's, listen. Its atmosphere is one of contemplation. Not in a mystical sense, but in an everyday one. Here, contemplation is not an isolated act, but a way of life. Dwelling becomes a ceremony: walking barefoot on the pasta tile floor, opening a door and hearing the birds sing, sitting down to read in the low light of the setting sun.
Finnish architect Juhani Pallasmaa wrote that “architecture shapes our innermost being.” At Casa Lorena, that idea becomes palpable. The house modulates gestures, slows down time, compels us to look. It is no longer about doing, but about being. Luxury here is not material, but temporal: having a moment to observe how the shadow moves across the masonry wall.
Every corner seems to beg for a pause. There are no frantic routes or aimless corridors. The layout prioritizes slow transitions, prolonged stays, and attentive observation. Emptiness becomes an emotional resource, an invitation to stop.
The art of not doing
In times when architecture is often confused with spectacle, Casa Lorena proposes a different ethic: that of doing with less. Not out of austerity, but out of wisdom. Because space is not filled with things, but with relationships. Relationships with light. With the wind. With the past. With time.
The project doesn't showcase technical solutions, but it contains them all: passive climate control strategies, integrated vegetation, ventilated roofs, and conscious orientation. The technical aspect never appears as an aesthetic gesture, and yet everything is meticulously resolved.
There is a profoundly Latin American quality to this house: the ability to improvise without losing rigor, to reuse without sacrificing beauty, to reinterpret without destroying . It is an architecture that accepts the climate, history, and limitations, and transforms them into opportunities.
Where others see smallness, this house finds the essential. Where others see a leftover lot, here a home appears. Where others would build, this house simply doesn't. And in that act of not building, it teaches us another way of seeing.
At Casa Lorena, the architectural oxymoron becomes an everyday experience: an inhabited void. A space where silence builds, where shadow orders, where boundaries dissolve. There is no spectacle, no sculptural forms, no aggressive textures. There is calm. There is natural light. There is an honest structure that supports without ostentation.
Perhaps its greatest lesson lies not in what it proposes, but in what it omits. In an era that celebrates form, this house celebrates space. In a culture of excess, it opts for minimalism. In an architecture of response, Lorena poses a question.
Architecture isn't always about building more, but about learning to empty. To silence the walls. In an era that celebrates the obvious, Casa Lorena chooses to be subtle. And in that subtlety, perhaps, lies its greatest revolution.
We're interested in learning how other architects, designers, and spatial thinkers approach the act of not building as part of the design process. What are your thoughts on the relationship between emptiness and the experience of living? Do you believe that silence, shadow, and time can be tools as powerful as matter?
Comments