Sayeh Residential Building, Tehran

The project was referred to our office at a stage when its structure had already been built based on an ostensibly classical design. The client's wish at that time — influenced by a different current, the so-called "modern" — was to revisit the design of the plans and the facade. The already-constructed structure imposed certain constraints upon us, including the existing column placement, the relatively low floor heights, and a 45-degree chamfer on the facade.

Simultaneously with revising the plans and achieving the desired spatial order, the central idea was to design a facade that, beyond conveying an overall sense of simplicity — in a context where excess of color, material, and superfluous detail has disfigured the urban landscape — would, by returning to the principles of aesthetics, including proportion, scale, rhythm, and the balance of vertical and horizontal lines, arrive at a perception of a static whole that nonetheless possesses dynamic details.

The residents of this building feel the stone beyond the facade, within their living spaces. The carved and polished stone bars, which pass through the facade skin as vertical louvers with a trapezoidal cross-section and enter the principal interior spaces, not only partially enclose the more private areas — the guest room and the terrace — but also bring reflected natural light into the interior at different hours of the day.

The varying cut angles of the stone bars in the facade skin's arrangement create different shadows and half-shadows at different times of day, and their white, polished surfaces also play a role in reflecting direct sunlight inward. Furthermore, the details of the stone bars — extending into the interior and combining with vertical mirrors — create a harmonious interplay of light, shadow, and reflection that, in addition to lending depth to the facade, fosters a dreamlike and poetic perception of the interior space.