Engineer Breno Bulus had lengthy coveted his neighbour’s land, with its historical forest and gardens in prime place overlooking Rio de Janeiro’s Pedra da Gávea mountain and the capital’s glowing shoreline. Located in Itanhanga, 20km west of Rio, when the plot got here up on the market in 2020, Breno snapped it up. Two years later, he and his spouse, Priscilla, a gynaecologist, and their youngsters, Antônia, 12, and Nuno, 8, moved into their purpose-built Scandinavian-inspired cabin and tropical landscaped backyard.
“I had at all times dreamed of residing on a farm and this piece of land was our probability to reside in a rustic home in the midst of the town,” says Breno, proprietor of the footwear chain Outer and, impressed by his new backyard, an super-comfortable out of doors furnishings vary, Memo. With the assistance of architects Bel Lobo and Mariana Travassos (Be.Bo Arquitetura) who had designed the Outer outlets, Breno wished to create “a forest in the midst of an city setting and to reside inside it. The concept was to create a really pure and primitive-looking backyard and a really up to date home. I just like the distinction between the natural and pure and the city and straight.”
The residing areas, kitchen and three bedrooms look on to the backyard. “The home has numerous glass and intense gentle,” says Breno. “There’s complete integration with nature and an invite to benefit from the outside, each day and night time.”
The home is constructed from cement planks, usual with grooves and painted in a graphite pigment to resemble rustic logs. Inside, the partitions are lined with pine to carry heat and color, complemented by plywood ceilings. The soothing cabin aesthetic is offset by fastidiously positioned artefacts and family objects, with Priscilla’s mom taking part in a key half within the visible curation of every little thing from a crimson meals mixer to a fruit bowl.
However essentially the most used piece of furnishings in the home is the wood eating desk, says Breno, pale pendant lights above and glass doorways at both finish resulting in the “enchanted forest” that surrounds the dwelling. “I like consuming with the household and watching the lake within the background,” he provides. Japanese fish share the lake with two tiger turtles and the Brazilian water lily Vitória-Régia. “I adore it when its flowers seem in the midst of the lake. They solely final a number of days.”
Between the eating desk and residing space, a small desk sits in opposition to gray concrete slats with a wood-like texture. Curios are artfully displayed, together with a pair of ceramic palms sculpted by Breno’s father-in-law – a physician in addition to an artist in his spare time. Two work hanging on the wall above proceed the monochrome theme, one a chair, the opposite summary objects – stones, maybe –, and converse to the clear strains and the softer ones at play.
The wall, like this curated nook, serves to interrupt up the area. “The home was designed in a linear projection,” explains Breno. “To interrupt the monotony, the architects designed it as if there have been two staircases that join via this area with the glass-enclosed eating desk. This wall features because the facade of one of many homes, regardless of being indoors.”
Summary work that once more play with strains and interstices fill the partitions above the unfussy white couch in the lounge, most of them painted by Breno. Two big letters spelling out “OK” and a crimson graphic picture with the phrases “OPTIMISTIC” set a mellow tone, the white cowhide rug on the ground and the cushioned bench space inviting you to chill out and benefit from the white and the sunshine. It’s a temper that continues within the corridor the place a mounted bicycle painted white to match the canvas, picked up in a neighborhood market, rests straightforward on the white wall. A daring, shiny crimson geometric sculpture bench by Brazilian designer Marcos Bravo holds its personal in opposition to the greenery outdoors, disrupting one other examine in white: a second white couch, extra summary linear work, one other letter (a large capital N) on the wall. Right here, once more holding issues full of life, a bespoke black and white geometric rug works an Escher vibe.
Serenity guidelines once more in Breno and Priscilla’s bed room, shades of blue in dialogue with the ocean, the plywood ceiling, wood wardrobes, taupe linen mattress throws meshing in flip, with nature in all its abundance seen out on the deck. “The concept behind the design is that from the within of the home you see crops all over the place, and nothing else.”
The youngsters’s bedrooms, painted in shades of inexperienced to take care of that outside-in connection, have the identical big glass doorways, white muslin curtains, no try to dam out the sunshine, which is the star of this immersive dwelling. Even the bogs, with their crops, surround-plywood or planes of stone, gesture to the pure world that Breno and his household revere as each playground and sustaining supply.
The home is designed to get everyone outdoors, regardless of the climate. “I’m fascinated by nature and all its textures,” says Breno. “The concept with the swimming pool was for it to mix into the setting; the selection of paving brings features of a pure lake to it.”
However what he particularly loves is the fireplace pit. “The campfire nook is what I like most about the home,” he says. “I wished it lengthy earlier than the mission for this home even started. I collect buddies round it, its magic much more highly effective on chilly days… It’s simply such a disgrace that chilly days are so uncommon in Rio.”
Supply hyperlink