Shahida Villa

The plot gives almost nothing to the street, so the design concentrates on the single surface that people actually see.

The upper floors are wrapped in a perforated terracotta screen that runs the full width and height of the front elevation. During the day it shades the rooms behind it and reads as a solid textured plane. After dark the logic inverts: light from inside passes through the perforations and the whole facade becomes a lantern.

At ground level the screen lifts clear to reveal a recessed, planted entrance court behind a low steel gate, which gives the house a threshold it would not otherwise have had. The rest of the building is deliberately plain so that nothing competes with the screen.