The philosophy of the Façade studio lies in its constant desire to redefine architectural thinking. To do so, the founders take us to Geni, a village in Lefkada, Greece, surrounded by rocky cliffs and the Ionian Sea. The project, called “Wedge,” won the Architizer A+Awards 2022 Jury Award.

This complex, under construction, consists of two identical private houses. The House-[V] and The [v]-house. The first, located on the upper level, is dedicated to guests. Its underground structure includes indoor and semi-outdoor spaces and follows the geometry of a wedge, that small object often shaped like a triangle that serves to fix or separate another room. The second offers daytime and nighttime living areas structured in rows. As the studio states, “the triangular prism seems to have been wedged into the natural ground, splitting the dwelling in two, filtering and separating daytime living spaces from nighttime ones.”

But Façade takes its thinking a step further, drawing its overall inspiration from the city’s name, Lefkada, which refers to the “white stone” in Homer’s Odyssey, the opaline color that the island’s gray cliffs can take on when the sun beams down. These white triangular prisms, which look like “holds,” are a nod to the Greek poet, creating unexpected and unprecedented spatial conditions, conducive to living. 

Nathalie Dassa