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This House is Derived from the Typology of Defensive Architecture

Zicatela House by Ludwig Godefroy Architecture

Zicatela house is a small weekend house located on top of a hill in front of Zicatela beach, next to Puerto Escondido in the state of Oaxaca, Mexico.


The house was designed with one main purpose: to give the owner the opportunity to leave Mexico City to make a break with the megalopolis and urban habits, by coming to get some rest and relax while enjoying the heat of the Mexican coast and the peaceful light of Oaxaca.

Picture Courtesy: Ludwig Godefroy Architecture

This house responds to a double landscape, on one side in the background the beach and the sea, on the other side the mountains and agave fields, the plant from which is made mezcal and tequila. This project has a very interesting personality of being a countryside house next to the sea, instead of a beach house.

Picture Courtesy: Ludwig Godefroy Architecture

The house is based on this duality, the duality of its surroundings and it´s ability to respond to the mountains and be protective as a fortress as well as a widely open space; giving you the feeling to live outside in a garden, making the border between in and out disappear.

Picture Courtesy: Ludwig Godefroy Architecture

Zicatela house is built on a small 300 m2 plot, using the typology of defensive architecture, where a wall surrounds the terrain completely, helping create an 100% controlled area on the inside, turning it into an open-sky fortress, with only one main view towards the sky, the only permanent element in time.

Picture Courtesy: Ludwig Godefroy Architecture

"The house is a bunker on the outside, one of those massive concrete structures I used to see in Normandy, where I was born, protecting a Mexican pyramid on the inside, one of those I use to see when I travel around in Mexico, the country where it´s been 10 years now I live and work." - Ludgwig Godefroy


Project: Casa Zicatela

Location: Puerto Escondido , Oaxaca, México

Design House: Ludwig Godefroy Architecture

Photography: Rory Gardiner


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