Francisca House

Architect: MATHIAS KLOTZ

Collaborators: Héctor Hormazabal, Eduardo Ruiz-Risueño and Minh Nghi                       

43°13’13.69″S

73°39’39.07″O

Coldita

Chile

The Francisca House is a holiday house located on the Coldita Island in the south of the Chiloe Island. 

Coldita is a tiny, sparsely populated Island, which has neither roads nor cars. All the journeys must be done on foot or by horse. The connection to the Isla Grande (Main Island) is by any means of embarkment. 

The plot is located at a rural territory of 166 ha which possesses an extensive, rocky seaside, beaches, forests and a delta of a tiny river. 

The house is located on a small plateau close to the sea and overlooks two beaches, a forest and is facing a mountain range of the Andes that fall directly into the sea creating a fascinating landscape of fjords, lakes, glaciers and volcanoes. 

The House Francisca was conceived as a refuge to relax for the family, their friends and seafarers on their way from and to Patagonia where the territory is virgin and almost totally uninhabited.  

The spatial concept is very simple: it has only one nave inspired by the architecture of the granaries that are common in the area. Inside a double-height space houses the main functional program on the ground floor and above includes a mezzanine, the guestrooms are situated at both ends of the second floor.

There is a winter garden at one end of the house in order to enjoy a semi exterior room in this cold and rainy region. 

Inside the wooden structure is exposed and painted in white. A skylight runs along the whole volume to illuminate the total interior in a warm light.