Architects: Dionisis Sotovikis, Kirki Mariolopoulou | Collaborating architect: Mirto Tzortzi | Construction: Dionisis Sotovikis | Photos: Vangelis Paterakis |2009
“Should architecture simply design the spaces or explore conceptual and psychological dilemmas in order to suggest different ways of re-thinking our lives, ourselves and in extension the society that we live in?”
This was the fundamental question on which the architects based the renovation of this second floor apartment located in a residential area north of the center of Athens, Greece.
At the central axis of the apartment, a wall creates on either side the main living spaces. On one side we have the more public spaces, living room, dining area, kitchen and a small study; while on the other, we have the more intimate spaces of the owner, the bedroom and the bathroom.
These two spaces, public and private, are divided by a thin transparent line that “unifies” not only visually but also conceptually the bedroom with the living room, the kitchen with the bathroom, the shower room and toilet with the living room.
Why is there a psychological differentiation between? What is the threshold that psychologically divides the bed from the sofa, the sink from the water basin and how can someone cross it over?
As these spaces come together, through the transparency, they interact with each other revealing their common points as well as their differences. The aim was to create not only a window to “look at” the outside but a window to “see” the inside at the same time.
Therefore we have the ability to experience two or more spaces concurrently, knowing that we have the choice of privacy by altering transparency to opacity just by pressing a button.
This is an apartment that does not attempt to suggest new aesthetic approach by being contemporary or just functional but emphasizes on these psychological limitations in order to extenuate the necessity for redefining facts.