Beach Retreat Inspired By Ancient Astro-architects
By Joe Wertz
A shrine to the panoramic heavens above, the basic plans for the Universe Beach House were engineered centuries ago by a culture half a world away. Using modern materials and contemporary design, renowned artist Gabriel Orozco and architect Tatiana Bilbao’s beach retreat was inspired by Jantar Mantar, a site built between 1727 and 1734 in Jaipur, India, which hosts more than a dozen ancient tools built to predict and track astronomical phenomenon like orbits and eclipses.
Orozco told Italian design blog Abitare that he was taken with visitors’ interactions with the historic site during a visit in the mid-1990s. Impressed by their willingness to walk atop and sit on the various structures, Orozco and Bilbao employed a similar mindset for the beach house, which is built much like an ad-hoc research camp. Each room is intertwined and connected; exiting one, homeowners enter another, an efficient if unusual residential arrangement. Like Jantar Mantar, the Universe Beach House is open and oriented with a 360-degree layout that pivots around an eye-like rooftop swimming pool. [via besttopdesign]
