Text description provided by the architects. The three-year pandemic reshaped the way people live and work, and the owner of this house was no exception. In 2023, they decided to return to their parents’ home in the village and rebuild a house that could accommodate three generations while also serving as a home office. In the years to come, they may settle here permanently, no longer needing to commute between the city and countryside for work.
As always, the intent of this design is to address real-life challenges. It does not aim to embrace abstract notions of “tradition” or aesthetic conventions. Kenneth Frampton wrote that confronting a place’s inherent issues can become an opportunity for the development of critical regionalism. This idea aligns with my own interests.
The project is located in Tongzhou, Beijing, where building regulations appear to be stricter than in other suburban districts. For instance, residential plots are limited to single-story structures with an eave height of no more than 3 meters. As a result, Xifa Village remains flat and expansive. Even the more recently renovated courtyards continue to follow the traditional heyuan (courtyard house) layout, lying low against the vast landscape. My first visit to the site was on a rainy afternoon. The 700-square-meter courtyard made the existing house appear small beneath the immense sky. Despite the heavy clouds overhead, the eaves could not block the distant blue sky and sunlight. This sense of openness and spatial fluidity was the first thing the client expressed as their vision for the new house.
Given the site’s generous size and the project’s budget constraints, we planned a single-story house with a footprint of 300 square meters. A house with a modest volume and a spacious courtyard—this would be both an adaptation and a reinterpretation of the traditional rural courtyard dwelling.
The house is conceived as an interwoven structure, its wings extending in different directions and joining at their ends. To maintain the proportions of the central courtyard, the side wings were consolidated and pulled away from the perimeter, creating a narrow secondary courtyard at the rear. Similarly, the north-facing main hall was shifted southward, opening up a backyard. Each wing now enjoys dual-sided natural light, while the entire courtyard benefits from uninterrupted sightlines.
The gabled ends of the roofs extend outward, reaching toward the site’s boundaries. From above, the house forms a cross-like configuration. The spatial arrangement is evenly distributed, creating a series of terminal points—private rooms for the grandparents, parents, children, and visiting guests. The grandparents, like many elderly couples, preferred separate sleeping quarters, and the extremities of the house allowed for this subtle division. If these terminal points are seen as extended limbs, then the core of the house—its connective spaces—is elongated and subtly segmented, accommodating various public functions. This arrangement reflects the rhythms of multi-generational living, offering both proximity and separation as needed. People move through these spaces, shifting between moments of family gathering and more private interactions.
To create a sense of spatial openness, the building’s structural framework recedes toward the roof ridge. Structural elements from different directions converge at the shear wall cores, forming the cross-shaped structural anchor. The house, much like a mushroom, is supported at its center while its eaves extend outward in all directions. Freeing the perimeter from structural constraints allows the façade to dissolve, merging the interior and exterior. The cross-shaped layout creates a view that moves from near to far—courtyard, house, courtyard again—revealing overlapping scenes of daily life.
If the upper frames of the glass façades were aligned directly with the eaves, the interiors would have received over 3 meters of vertical glazing. However, this would have left the occupants feeling exposed and significantly increased energy consumption. Instead, we lowered the eaves beams to 2.4 meters, allowing the eaves to extend downward like the edge of a mushroom cap. This solution maintains a comfortable ceiling height while also creating a sense of shelter—whether under the bright sun or during heavy rain, those sitting by the window feel like small creatures nestled beneath a mushroom cap, protected and at ease.
While the house remains open and transparent toward the courtyard, its outward-facing façade is quite the opposite. The only exterior-facing elevation is itself one of the terminal spaces. The entrance semi-outdoor space extends downward along the sloping roof, while the brick perimeter wall, responding to the outward slope of the street and site, steps inward as it rises. As a whole, the building sits low and unassuming against the roadside.
Cite: “House of Cross / Chaoffice” 09 Apr 2025. ArchDaily. Accessed .
