San Vicente Residences

San Vicente Residences is organised as two blocks of homes joined around a planted court. Each face is composed of deep grey frames around recessed balconies, with timber-slat shutters that slide across the glass, so every home has an outdoor room and a way to temper the sun, and the building reads as a set of homes rather than a flat wall on the boulevard.

A tall stair tower marks the corner. Wrapped in horizontal slats behind a diagonal lattice of weathered steel, it shades the stair inside by day and glows like a lantern at night, and the same lattice is drawn in lines across the plaster of the second tower at the rear. Round openings cut through the frames give the facades a quieter counterpoint.

At ground level, parking is placed beneath the building behind sculpted screens, and the homes are set back behind planting, palms and a garden court with trees at its centre. The same design care is given to every home in the building, affordable or not: daylight, a balcony, and a garden in view from the way in.