Stair 住宅 by William Price is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2023 A' Design Award 铁奖 in 建筑与结构设计 Competition Category.

铁建筑· 2023

Stair 住宅

by William Price

Client: Billl Price

A' Design Award 铁奖 Winner in 建筑 Category

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Verified Award Winner

Verify Award Status for #137738

View at A' Design Award Press Release Award Badge

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The Design

About Stair 住宅

本项目挑战了住宅设计的固有范式，将环境与文化的可持续性纳入其核心理念。通过对既有建筑类型的重新诠释，它拓展了狭长城市填充地块中设计可能性的边界。可持续材料、深槽种植池护栏以及带顶棚的户外露台的运用，促进了人与自然的联系并实现了穿堂通风。这座住宅映射出在城市生活语境下，人与自然、人与人之间关系的演变。

The Recognition

About the A' Design Award 铁奖

Stair 住宅是 A' Design Award 铁奖得主，这是授予满足人们对设计精良的创作所期待的专业与工业要求的优良设计的声望认可。铁奖得主展现出其创作者的高超技艺、高度专业化、专家级的理解力和创造能力。预计Stair 住宅将成为一件备受推崇、令人钦佩且被珍爱的创作，既实用又创新。这件赢得 A' Design Award 铁奖的设计整合了行业最佳实践，并拥有与专业知识和才华相结合的称职技术特性。Stair 住宅因其严谨而受到尊重，旨在提供有助于让世界变得更美好的生活品质改善。

Behind the Design

Press Kit

Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.

Unique Properties: The project challenges the limited ways of thinking about residential design today as it relates to environmentally and culturally sustainable solutions. Under the umbrella of cultural and environmental sustainability, the house attempts to reinterpret an existing typology and provoke thought regarding how our relationship with nature and living with one another will evolve as we live longer in cities.
Dimensions & Packaging: This 3-story 3000 sq ft house sits on a 30ft by 100ft lot. The structure has wood framing and steel moment frames, and the walls are 30% recycled corrugated galvalume with insulated operable windows. The roof is waterproofed with TPO and has rigid and batt insulation. Outdoor patios have deep planter guard rails, and 3 types of stairs provide vertical circulation: circular, kick back, and tapered straight-run.
Tags: Nature, Green, House, Stair, Typology, Metal
Production Technology: The project is conceived as two volumes stacked atop one another. Each is made accessible to the other using three types of stairs. A tapered straight-run stair takes you from the street to the second level, a spiral stair takes you from the ground floor courtyard to the roof and a kickback stair takes you from the ground floor to the third floor. The lower volume is enclosed, released, and partitioned by a series of transparent and opaque walls. They move from the interior to the exterior, where they hold and gather nature, making it available to the interior.
Design Challenge: The creative challenge of the project centered around providing a comfortable living space with an emphasis on outdoor living, nature, air, and sunlight, all within the constraints of a narrow urban infill lot in Downtown, Houston Texas. The design incorporated open floor plans and large elevations of glass to maximize natural light. The three levels of the house feature covered outdoor patios, operable windows, and planter guard rails to promote cross-ventilation and a connection to nature. The use of deep planters on the patios added a lush, green element to the outdoor spaces and created a sense of privacy and intimacy.
Research: The Project attempts to bring together the best of the Dog Trot and Spanish Colonial houses while in essence bypassing their limitations. It is a living space that seizes upon the positive attributes of typology radically modified in light of the overriding and timely concerns of our time.
Inspiration: The Stair House draws inspiration from the traditional Dog Trot Houses located in the southern United States. The incorporation of breezeways in these houses promoted the circulation of air, which has been adapted into the Stair House design, both horizontally and vertically. Furthermore, the project takes inspiration from Spanish Colonial houses in the south that utilize porches to provide deep shade, protection from rain, and stairs to mitigate the challenges of second-floor living and being elevated off the ground.
Project Duration: The project started in January 2014 and finished in July 2018. Stair House is in the Lower Heights neighborhood of Downtown Houston, Texas. It is situated to the south of the White Oak Bayou and to the north of the rail line to Chaney Junction. Contextually the site is bound by the edge of an industrial zone to the south and the Olivewood Cemetery to the East with two and three-story residential development to the west. The Olivewood Cemetery marks where the First and Sixth Wards meet. It is a resting place for freed slaves and is the first African American cemetery in the Houston city limits.
Image Credits: image #1: courtesy of Bill Price and Photographer Ben Hill, editing by Alan Jauregui, 2022
image #2: courtesy of Bill Price and Photographer, 2022
image #3: courtesy of Bill Price and Photographer, 2022
image #4: courtesy of Bill Price and Photographer, 2022
image #5: courtesy of Photogrpaher Bill Price, 2021