Balai Fariñas 2

A rental villa going up on a ridge in Tanauan, laid out long and low so that every room faces the lake.

The project

The site looks west across Taal, with the volcano sitting in the middle of the view, so the plan is stretched along the ridge rather than turned in on itself. Living rooms and bedrooms all open onto the same terrace, which runs the length of the house and does the work of a corridor.

A deep soffit, stained dark, is carried well past the glass line to shade that terrace through the afternoon — the point at which the western sun would otherwise make it unusable. Above the sliding doors a band of louvred clerestory lets the rooms vent without opening the main glazing, which matters on a site this exposed.

The structure is concrete block with a steel roof frame, and the terraces are laid in large-format stone. These photographs run from the excavation through to the state it is in now: roof on, glazing going in, and the first rooms being plastered.

Site photographs taken through the build, most recent first.

Details