Edi & Hetty Home, Adi Purnomo Architect

The house is basically com- posed of two open boxes stacked one on top of the other and pro- tected by a protruding corrugated metal roof and a glass wall affixed to a steel frame. Timber-framed glass doors open to the garden.

 A tall table and a pair of bar chairs signal the entrance foyer, which spills into the open- plan living/dining area. The door on the left leads to the garage, while the staircase on the right goes up to the second floor.

The location of the Edi and Hetty Home in the Ragunan area of South Jakarta was a distinct challenge to architect Adi Purnomo. Houses in the Ragunan area are required to be aligned to a ten-meter building recess line regardless of the depth of the lot.While most plots in the neighbor- hood used to be over 1000 square meters, today many, if not most, have been split into smaller parcels of land and sold off.The lot on which this house stands has a depth of only around fifteen meters. Given the regulation ten- meter recess line, the buildable area was effectively reduced to a mere five meters from front to back.

The architect has chosen to turn this “loss” into an advantage by opting for a design based on the traditional rumah panggung (platform house), whereby the first floor of the house, which ranges across almost the entire width of the lot, is reserved for “public” or “communal” spaces, while the second is designated private space. In this way, the design maximizes the available buildable area.

A row of white built-in cabinets forms a wall screening the staircase from the open-plan living and dining areas on the first floor. The wooden floor extends out to the edge of the verandah, visually expanding the size of the space. The kitchen, placed behind the dining area, is the only physically closed-in room. The colors in the painting in the “foyer” are picked up in the simple modern furniture and accessories.

The second floor plan 

section view 

back elevation 

Above The second floor plan (top), section view (middle), and back elevation (below) all show the simplicity of the house’s design.

He has also treated the area in front of the house as a natural external “atrium” into which the spaces on both stories of the house extend.Vegetation is allowed to grow wild along the fence, emphasizing the boundaries of the site and demarcating the edge of this external “void.”

Because the house faces south, the architect was able to create a steel-framed rectangular box with a transparent screen façade stretching the entire length of the upper floor of the house. Cantilevered over a series of steel columns that are retracted from the edge of the verandah below, the spaces on this second floor, encased within the “floating” glass box, extend to the natural external “atrium” createdby the ten-meter recess line.The columns appear to pierce the box from underneath, except for a gap where a set of large wood-framed glass doors open to the verandah. Otherwise, the construction creates five equal-sized bays which correspond to the way in which the internal spaces are organized. A corrugated iron roof is cantilevered over the floating glass box, providing shade and preventing rain- fall from entering the house, at the same time enhancing the fusion between the inside and outside spaces.

The notion of inside–outside is heightened by the continuous wooden flooring that extends from the main space of the first floor, though the four sets of swinging doors, and into the garden in front of the house.This also creates the illusion that the house is bigger than it really is.

The entrance to the house, on the left of the site, is concealed by a wooden picket fence. A horizontally slatted wooden screen adjacent to the first set of doors shields views to the garage. Once inside the house, the longitudi- nal wood-floored open space on the first floor ends with the dining area and kitchen at the far end.

Access to the rooms on the second floor is via a wood-lined set of stairs hidden behind a slender row of white-painted cabinets. On the upper floor, the first two bays accommodate the two children’s bedrooms.Themaster bedroom is placed in the fifth bay, and extends out to a small extension that slightly protrudes from the main floating box. Occupying two bays between the children’s bedrooms and the master bedroom is the family living room. Paralleling the cabinets below, another set of cabinets on the second floor shields the staircase and its simple steel balustrade. A similar balustrade provides protection in front of the glass windows, while the wooden ceiling above the staircase echoes the material used on the stairs and on the floor below.

The family room commands views of the garden below through the continuous glass walls covering the entire façade of the second floor. Waist- high white metal railings placed inside the glass provide security.

The staircase, lined in wood, leads directly to the living room on the second floor. From here, a corridor goes to the children’s bedrooms. The open white metal railing makes the corridor feel more spacious, while the gray-toned ceramic floors and pale green furnishings add light-ness and brightness.

The master bedroom also overlooks the garden in front through the glass wall opening which brings plenty of light into the room. Bright red hanging heli-conias and colorful bedding con-trast well with the pale walls and curtains.

Large wood-framed glass swinging doors allow generous access to the verndah and garden. The continuous flooring expands the space. A trim of pebbles forms the drip line for the overhanging corrugated metal roof.

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