It’s hard to miss. On a speedy drive on Roxas City’s quiet coastal road, the Baybay House by BAAD Studio is a sophisticated standout among its rustic scenery.
In vast and spare rural pastures, luxury is often expressed in grand scale, vivid color or opulent ornament meant to shock and awe, but the Baybay House challenges the expectation through skillful proportion, elevated materiality and sleek technicality.
“My friend (the client) was not very particular about the layout, she just requested particularly on nice stairs, they grew up in nice houses and were big on the grand staircase” says Ar. An Bermejo – Mendoza while gesturing a spiral with her hands, communicating the typical classical expression of the grand staircase we have come to associate with grand houses. Perhaps in the comfort of friendship, BAAD knew to push expectations on what a grand staircase could be and offer “an iteration of a contemporary grand staircase,” adds Ar. An.
Opposite of the guarded facade, the fence is shed to reveal a flipside that is generous and open. “It was the dream of (the client) to live in front of that horizon,” offers Ar. Benjee poignantly. What once was a childhood dream, is realized through BAAD Studio’s plan and program. The view at the house is not reserved for special occasions, rather it is leveraged for the everyday. Whether at the common spaces of the ground floor or at the private bedrooms of the second floor, exposure is maximized.
As with dreams, there are threats to the house. Not exempt from disastrous typhoons, the large windows become a point of vulnerability. Perhaps form follows fortitude then, as the designers were inspired by the tapered form of tankers that ease the force of an incoming bullet. The same intent was envisioned for the angled walls, meant to deflect winds and mitigate damage. At the same time, the pocket formed by the walls cleverly conceal sliding wooden lattices – another layer of defense. The angles are reinforced even in the minute details of the railing and metal screens, and at the eaves, the angled aluminum edge, sharp as a blade, seems to pierce the horizon.
With the careful attention of the architects, who also happen to be dear friends, memory and memento find themselves embedded throughout the house. Together, client and designers created a space to long for, a house one can be eager to return to – a home to miss.
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Photographed by Ed Simon.
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