[Piers] It’s time, Caroline,to go and see how the other half live.
[Caroline]Talk about welcome to my humble abode!
Cor, that is a whole lot of house!
[Caroline] He's Piers Taylor,an award-winning architect.
I mean, the depth of this wall,it’s four foot thick.
After you, my Lord.
[Piers] And she’s Caroline Quentin,
acclaimed actressand passionate property developer.
This house has the perfect ratioof bedrooms to swimming pools.
[Caroline]We’ve been given the keys to some
of the most incredible houses
in the world.
If we were left alone herefor any amount of time, I have a feeling--
-We would ruin this house.-[laughs]
[Piers]To discover the design innovation, passion
and endurance neededto transform architectural vision
into an extraordinary home.
Look, I’m dumbstruck.
[Caroline] We’re travelling the globe.
[Piers] Meeting architects and owners
to explore how their daring homesrespond uniquely to local landscape,
climate and culture.
I think this is probablythe greatest house I've ever been in.
[Caroline]Whether it’s battling the elements
to construct a dream home
on dramatic Scandinavian terrain...
The architect was nervousthat things would go wrong,
he couldn’t bear to look at it.
[Piers] Pushing the boundariesof European experimentation...
-I think that's it.-I think it is.
When I looked at the proposal,
in the beginning I was almost shocked.
[Caroline] Celebrating craftsmanshipand beauty in Asia...
We’ve likened this houseto dripping chocolate sauce
all over vanilla ice cream.
[Piers] ...or going all outfor glamour in America.
You just do what you do best,is to create a masterpiece.
Piers! Is this too Miami?
[Piers] This time we’re in a country
which has a rich tradition of flamboyancein architecture,
Spain.
There’s something in the Spanish culture,
that toreador in tight trouserswith glittery embroidery,
I still feel it in the culture here,it’s brave, it’s…
-Showmanship. When you think of Gaudi...-Yeah.
Really, I mean the most theatrical wayof making buildings in a way.
-Yeah.-I mean, the most exotic way.
-Daring again.-Daring.
Mould-breaking.
[Piers] Gaudi threw down the gauntletfor future architects
and it’s this sense of adventurethat’s brought us to Spain,
where there’s so muchthrilling architecture.
[Caroline] The same spirit can be foundin residential properties, too.
So we’re heading awayfrom the crowded coastlines
and into Spain’s dramatic interior.
[door clicks open][gasps]
It’s a land of experimentation...
This is a building made outof what looks like pieces of bridge.
[Piers] Where architects are re-writingthe rulebook.
This would be a normal front door.
But it tells youthe scale of the building. It’s so big.
[Caroline] From high art homes
to beautiful spaces for practical living.
You have a wonderful life here.
-Salud.-Salud.
[Piers]We’ll uncover some extraordinary homes
that challenge and surprise.
That’s right. It feels sacred.
It feels sacred, doesn’t it?
[Piers] Our journey beginsin the northeast corner of Spain
in the foothills of the Pyrenees.
For a thousand years, religious travellershave passed through here
on their way to the holy cityof Santiago de Compostela.
But we’re making a pilgrimageof a different kind.
The home we’re visiting
is totally unlike the stone farmhouses
found in this beautiful region.
Designed by architects who haverecently won the Pritzker prize,
the noble prize of architecture,
this house has garneredan awful lot of attention internationally,
not least because it’s madeentirely of rusted metal.
-Are you excited about seeing this house?-I'm very excited.
I'm making a pilgrimageto see something really significant.
Piers, I think that’s our building there,that low lying little tiny,
looks like little tin shacks.
-I think that's it.-I think it is.
[Piers] Here we are.
[Caroline laughs]
[Piers] It's cut into the edgeof the hillside, isn't it?
Is it my imagination, Piers, or is it?
There's something slightly comedicabout it,
because it is just a row of little boxes.
But that's what's so fantastic, is that
making interesting architectureisn’t about making interesting shapes
and that’s somethingthat this is telling us.
[Caroline] That’s fascinating,
‘cause I think a lot of people perceive it
as actually just a form, about form.
-But---Frank Gehry in Bilbao,
making something that says "Look at me."
This says "Don’t look at me."
Yes, it does,except I am going to look at it.
[Piers] This house isa really exceptional piece of architecture
by any standard.
Built for a famous chef and her family,
this home is designed to appear
like a series of agricultural buildings
that merge with the landscape.
Created by architectsat the top of their game,
it redefineshow a domestic building can look.
I’m fascinated by this house.
[Caroline] This feels like the entrance
to an art gallery or a theatre.
[Piers] But it’s also, curiously,like a bit of a motorway underpass,
and I mean that as a compliment‘cause it’s heroic
and really, very un-front door-like.
[both laugh]
I think this might be the way in.
This is the front door I was looking for.
What's great is thatthat is front door size.
Actually, it's about front door widthand this would be a normal front door,
but it tells youthe scale of the building.
It’s so big, it’s so tall. It’s four timesas tall as a normal front door.
And there's yet another entrance in here.
Which has a veil-like quality to it,doesn't it?
Look at this, Piers, look.[gasps]
-Wow.-Have you worked out what this is?
-It's a lift.-What's fantastic is
that it’s absurd in many ways,
there’s a lift in a piece of groundthat’s quite flat.
‘Cause you could just walk straight in,but I love the theatre of it.
This is really dramatic, and I hate lifts.
[Caroline laughs]
[C] A key challenge for the architectswas to build this four-bedroom home
along the edge of an escarpment.
The underground entrance was excavated
and foundations cut into the ridge linealong a 60-metre plot.
Designed to resembleagricultural buildings,
the house is made upof 11 specially crafted steel boxes,
all linked by a steel corridor,
cleverly hidden by a man-made ridge.
Planted up to blend inwith the surrounding landscape.
The master bedroom is at one endwith three further bedrooms at the other.
In between, there's a generous amountof living space.
The lift arrivesinto the centre of the house.
[Caroline] What's through here?
-It’s almost disorientating.-It is.
[Caroline] It's such a dark entrance.
I’ve never been in a house
where you enter completely in the dark.
With nothing in it to give you any senseof where you are.
And then suddenly the light.
[Caroline] Oh!
[sound of crickets and birds]
[Caroline] I'm speechless.
Are you thrilled?
I think I’m most thrilled by
this sense that there’s a building
that in many ways is a piece of high art,
and yet it’s only really
one or two steps awayfrom a farmer’s slurry pit.
This is rooted in this landscapein the best possible way.
You can almost see the cows coming into drink at this, can't you?
[Caroline] This house is truly minimalist.
[Piers] I'm really enjoyingthe simplicity and silence.
[Caroline]So I can take a good look around in peace.
Thing about houses like this is
they always look so immaculate,they are so minimalist.
But like every family,they've got clutter.
I just have to find out where it is.
Aha. oh.
[door bangs]
Aha.
[gasps]
This is where they hide all those things
that you and I seefor the rest of our lives,
all the time.
Ooh!
Interesting.
There are even entire rooms behind doors.
[Piers] This house could have felt coldand uninviting,
but through their manipulationof the play of light on steel,
the architects have created a warmand captivating atmosphere.
It makes me wonder why more housesaren’t made completely from metal.
[Caroline] And I wonder if I’ll needa can opener to find the television?
There's nothing on.
There's a steely determinationto hide life's functionality here.
Although its aesthetically pleasing,
I imagine it can be a challengeto live with.
Nowadays it seems that every house
has a room which has a specific function
and we need to knowwhat every bit of it is for,
but this house has more void,
more emptiness than actual room.
And it’s in these voids,in this empty space,
that for me, this house comes alive.
I’m completely blown away by it.
Unfortunately, I've come to the bedroom
and there doesn't appear to be a bed.
Unless I'm missing something and...
like the rest of the house, it's...
it's hidden behind a panel.
Hang on.
[laughs]
Ingenious, these Spanish.
[screams and laughs]
I'm going to roll right under the stairsand go to bed.
[sighs]
[Piers] I think this buildingis intriguing both inside and out.
I’d like to find outfrom architect Rafael Aranda
what the clients really wantedwhen they approached them
to design the house.
They wanted a placethey could feel secluded.
And where they would be
in close contact with the landscape.
There’s also one single material
that binds this house together.
Why steel?
It’s a material that allows usto be contemporary
but it also has the featureof being full of life.
So you can see
the passage of time in the material.
We want architecture to conveya sense of the passage of time.
But this house is also
a place that has
an extraordinary atmosphere.
It’s a house that wants to bean experience.
Basically.
So...
It wants...
to give the people living in it,as well as visitors,
an emotional experience.
[Caroline] It’s an experienceenjoyed by the owner, Fina Puigdevall,
who lives here with her husbandand two daughters.
Hello, hennies.
We’re exploring the kitchen garden
below the house.
These eggs,are they for home or the restaurant?
The restaurant. The home.
Both? You use them for both?
[Caroline] Fina’s a Michelin-starred chef,
who is passionate about cookingwith fresh local ingredients.
[Caroline] Can we take in some chard?-Yeah.
[Caroline]Oh, it’s a big one. So he’s good.
We’ll give that carrot to Piers.
[Piers]The kitchen is Fina's natural habitat
and it's probably a good ideanot to get under the feet of a chef
while she's hard at work.
[Caroline]The use of steel and rusted steel
is quite a bold statement, isn’t it?
And I’d expect it to feelquite intimidating and quite rough.
But this house is actuallyincredibly welcoming and very warm.
Very warm, I mean steel
is a warm colour. This mild steel
that is corroding slightly,has this red warm,
almost leather-like feel to it.
Raw things often are warmer
than things that are finishedand polished and everything.
And I think
this material gives this rooma really sumptuous feeling.
It makes it feel luxurious actually,
even though it's mild steelthat's just going rusty.
[Caroline] It’s lovely to bring the natureactually into the house.
-Look, the dragonflies are coming in.-Yeah.
[Caroline laughs]They are mating on their way in.
[P] Maybe that's to keep the chickens out
‘cause without that, the chickenscould just come in,
which I think would bereally nice actually.
[sound of church bells]
[Caroline]There’s no chicken on the menu today.
-For you.-Delicious, wow.
[Caroline] Just that home-grown veg.
[Piers] So,
what has the architecture
of this brought to your life?
[in Spanish] Everything.
Yeah.
[in Spanish] And I think it’s a great idea
that you enter the housebelow ground level.
You never see cars.
Just nature.
[Caroline] What is the thingthat brings you most delight,
most joy about living here?
[in Spanish] Mm...
It’s a place where there’s great peace.It makes you feel peaceful.
And you don’t need to do a thing.
I love to come hereand not do a single thing.
Just watch the hours pass.
[Caroline] Peace, to peace.
This house and to peace.
[Caroline] I had my doubtsabout living in a big steel box,
but I’m warming to the idea.
[Piers] I think at the end of the day,which this is,
you can judge a houseby the quality of its fire.
I actually love the generosityof this fire,
and I love the way that the fire is levelwith the ground around it.
Have you ever seen a bigger flue?
Be careful how you answer that.
[both laugh]
[Piers] We've left farmland behind
and travelled south-westto the outskirts of the capital city.
[Piers] Here in the suburbs,one architect has chosen
to showcase his workby building a really unusual family home.
I grew up in suburbia
and the thing I rememberabout suburban houses
is the sort of similarity
that nobody wants to really to doanything out of the ordinary
or anything that will makethe neighbours stare.
[Piers]
But this architect isn’t worried aboutcreating a stir in the neighbourhood,
he’s done something very different.
[Caroline] Wow!
[Caroline]
Unhampered by the usual stricturesof a suburban build,
this house wears its challengingarchitectural identity
like armour, on the outside.
For the ancient Greeks,
Hemeroscopium was a placethat only existed in the mind.
A place defined by light.
Will this concrete houselive up to its namesake?
[Piers] This is a hugely grand entrancein the classical tradition.
This is an extraordinary covered portico.
But it’s not a classical building.
I mean, this is a building made outof huge bits of concrete,
made out of what looks like
pieces of bridge.
[C] It feels historic, doesn’t it?
[Piers] It does,I mean, this is a bit of ancient Greece,
that’s landed in a Spanish suburb
but it’s made outof 21st Century materials like concrete.
And there's a swimming pool anda table tennis table
and a speaker and--
[Caroline] It’s the ancient and the modernall in one place.
[Caroline]Creating this home was a challenge.
It took owner-architect,Anton Garcia-Abril,
a year just to calculatethe exact positioning of each element.
[Piers] The house is madeof seven vast concrete and steel beams,
each supporting the otherin the form of an upward spiral,
held in placeby a 20-tonne lump of granite
which acts as a counterweight.
Outside, the beams form a large courtyardaround the swimming pool.
Downstairs, there’s plentyof family living space
and upstairs there’s the main bedroomand another for the children.
[Caroline]The real genius of this house
is that it's made of sectionsof pre-cast concrete and steel,
normally foundin huge construction projects.
Take a closer look at Hemeroscopium
and bridges, motorways, overpasses
and even drainage ditches start to appear.
But miraculously put it all togetherand the result is...
heroic.
[Piers] This is a dining roomand this is a living room
but again unlike most suburban houses,
they are made out of the mostenormous pieces of pre-cast concrete
of this scale.
This is a pre-cast concrete plankon the floor,
the sort that you'd makea car park out of.
And this inside and outside wall
at the back here is a 20-metre long
pre-cast concrete I beam.
[Piers]The structure has been left exposed
throughout the house, creating a strikingbackground for informal family life.
I can’t go on without showing youthis special surprise
which leads off the bedroom.
Look at this.
Imagine waking up in the morningand then thinking,
"I just fancy a little bit of a swim."
And just off your bedroom...
is this.
Not a bad way to start the day, is it?
[Caroline]The spectacular floating swimming pool
is supposed to give the swimmerthe experience of flying.
I’m looking forwardto taking flight later.
It’s remarkablethat a house made of bits of motorway
can be so homely,
despite the 230-tonne concrete shell
and mammoth proportions.
And the height of the house
offers an added bonus.
An outdoor space that would be the envyof any suburban curtain-twitcher.
And this is the perfect vantage point
to see how this extraordinary house,
this huge structure sitsin ordinary suburban Madrid.
[Piers] Considering how boldthe whole of the exterior is,
the interior doesn’t need to makequite as much of a statement.
Have you discovered, Caroline,
this is actually quitea straightforward house inside.
The kitchen isn't perchedat the end of an enormous cantilever
bit of concrete or something.
No, it’s a modest house
inside an extraordinary exterior.
Because it’s all about that space,
that living room.
[Piers] It's all about this.
[Caroline] Outside space, the weather
and having a wonderful placeto be outside.
[Caroline]Time for a dip in that mid-air pool.
This house has the perfect ratioof bedrooms to swimming pools.
Two bedrooms,
two swimming pools.
[Piers] From its floating poolto its cantilevered structure,
there’s an interesting and unusualarchitectural mind at work here.
I’m keen to find out morefrom Anton the architect.
So there’s seven key pieces of structurewith a stone on top
that stops everything from...
falling over, I guess?
Well, there’s a coil structure.
-It's a helix?-It's a helix.
Each piece is absolutely
essential to the equilibrium of the whole.
And all that circuit
culminateswith the 20-tonne granite stone.
Were you surprisedby the scale of all of this
when it came together?
Yeah. I was very surprised
that even though we usedthese heavy traces of structure,
that are massive,
we obtained a very light space.
Very transparent and light space.
By the action of lifting,
of the effort of the structure,
of almost unearthing,
this space became fluent,and light and transparent.
[Piers] Unsurprisingly,not many building contractors
would touch Anton's housewith a barge pole.
Which meant he had to overseethe work himself.
Having calculated
every position and manoeuvre in advance,
it took just seven days to buildthe structure of his family home.
And this is a family house, isn't it?You have children?
We have four kids.
Different ages from four to 16.
The 16-year-old
loves the courtyardto do his birthday parties
and the four-year-old
loves the transparency because
they could be all over the house
without being confined or enclosed.
How do you feel about this space now?
Where is the most potent bit of joyin this house?
I think there’s two moments of joyin this house.
The social moment that is
confined and embracedby the structure in this courtyard,
it’s an open courtyard.
and another extraordinary momentof this house is that
you get the panoramic viewswhen you go to bed at night.
But we love this house.
[Piers] And so do we.
[Piers] This house is really unusual.
There’s something really poetic in taking
these off-the-shelf pieces of structureand using them
to make domestic space.
[Caroline] I think what will stay with meabout this house
is arriving to find an heroic Greek temple
behind a gate on a suburban street.
It’s nice to walk off into the sunsetwith you, P.
It is. Where we going now?
[Caroline]We're going off the beaten track...
to a sleepy historic cornerof north-west Spain,
barely touched by tourism.
This may seem an unlikely place to find
cutting-edge architecture,
but this is Spainand anything is possible.
[Piers] Our next house turns
tradition on its head.
Not far out of town,
there’s an arts project going on
unlike anything else in the world.
[Caroline] And it’s out there somewhere
in this densely forested mountain region.
Our Sat Nav has brought usto the end of the road.
-[Caroline] Oh!-[Piers] Top of the hill.
[Caroline]And still no sign of civilisation.
[Piers]The architects of this holiday home
deliberately set out to challengeour preconceptions of how to live.
They were given free reign
to build this houseand it shows what can happen
if you give architects creative freedom.
[Piers]It’s a very singular thing, isn’t it?
A big O on a mountain top.
[P] So this is how you would commanda site historically, isn’t it?
[Caroline] Find the highest point?
[Piers] Well,this is a little hilltop fort, isn't it?
[Caroline]Yeah. I mean there is something ancient,
like we've stumbled uponsome sort of ancient civilisation,
but also it feels quite futuristic.
But a timeless wayof making a place ultimately.
At the top of a hill, push out
your defensible space to the outsideand then make
a sacred space in the middle.
That's right, it feels sacred, doesn't it?
-Sort of an Aztec sort of sacred quality.-[Piers] Yeah.
This is wild country out here.
And this is untamed wilderness.
[Caroline]Assigned a plot on a hilltop plateau,
the architects chosea circular 45-metre diameter design,
so as to makethe most of the panoramic views.
Four rows of steel columns supportthe roof
while walls of glass helpthe building dissolve into the landscape.
There are four crescent-shaped segmentsof domestic space,
including an outdoor utility room,
three bedroomsand a living room kitchen diner.
I like that ‘cause that sounds likeStarship Enterprise door.
I can never make that noise,I’ve never been able to.
You just did.
It’s a good space
for a kitchen, it’s sort of little,
-a little...-Slither.
-Yes, a slither of building,-That…
-Okay.-...opens up, I think.
For most of the year,you can open all of these screens.
-Push.-Nearly.
[Piers] And the character of this roomhas changed completely.
[Caroline] It's suddenly become
as one of the most amazing kitchensin the whole world,
because the wilderness is just here.
[Piers]It’s now the biggest room in Spain.
[Caroline] Yeah.
We’re out in the wilds,we’re by the mountains.
[Piers]What's wonderful is how close to nature
this house allows us to be.
[Piers]These open plan, crescent-shapedliving spaces are pretty radical,
but somehow they work.
I like the way it dealswith light and surface, it's beautiful.
I mean, that stuff I think is beautiful.
I think the quality of the lightfiltering through that expanded metal
and this polycarbonate is beautiful.
I mean, it's really sumptuous this housein some ways.
I mean, it's a beautiful thing,
but it’s made out of stuffand it's just industrial materials.
-[C] The floors are polished concrete?-[P] Polished concrete, yeah.
It’s had the surface ground off
and you see the exposed aggregate,you know.
[C] It looks like a terrazzo floor.
[Piers] It looks like terrazzobut its polished concrete.
[Caroline] Creating this circular propertywas an architectural challenge,
as the roof and floor areeach continuous stretches of concrete.
The floor was poured in one dayworking against the clock
to ensure that 550 tonnes of concrete
didn’t set before the circle was complete.
And with 800 scaffolding poles
providing support,
the process was repeatedto create the roof...
resulting in two seamless rings.
[Piers] This house has such a simple idea
because the idea
is one single simple circle.
And how this architect
has made it usable isto turn it into a square.
What they've done is add infour straight walls
across the plan
and what these square walls do is,of course,
allow you to place thingslike beds and kitchens, etc.
But I think the best thing, of course,
is that you never quite knowwhether you're inside or outside
or whether you'repart of this huge bit of wilderness
or whether you're still insidethis protected inner circle.
The great joy of this house
is that all the roomsopen up wide to the elements
and I don’t just mean the kitchen,I mean all the rooms.
The bedrooms and the bathrooms too.
Ah!
[Piers] I really love the waythat this living space works in the round,
and also the ambiguous relationshipbetween inside and out.
[Caroline] Just over the hill
is a second high concept house.
Both homes have been builtfor Frenchman Christian Bourdais.
Rather than collect modern art,he collects modern architecture.
His aim is to create a parkwith holiday rentals
designed by some of the mostadventurous architects in the world.
He’s currently making a film in Israel.
-[Christian] Hello.-[Caroline] Bonjour, bonjour!
Bonjour, Christian. Je suis Caroline. No.
[Caroline laughs]
-Hello.-Hi.
From the moment we arrived,it’s such a fun place to be.
Well, what we want to dowith the summer house programme
is kind of not speakingabout square metres
but about speakinga real architectural experience.
And is that how you came up with the ideaof this project?
The idea was to make
architecture collection of house...
in which all the architects can goa little bit further
than they used to go.
Where does it come from,
this desire to work with new architecture?
The world is goingagainst this architecture.
Developers today giveso many restrictions...
that the architects...
it's not so easy for the architectsto express their creativity.
And ultimately, Christian,
you are going to curatethis whole collection of buildings.
How many will there be?
Fifteen houses.
Wow.
[Caroline] A sneak preview of other housesChristian wants to build.
With architects given carte blanche,
the only limit is imagination.
This is a house that reminds me of the joy
of the artistry of architecture.
You can really experiment
and explore ideas for their own sake.
Don't you think?
Yeah, I do. I agree.
What can I do?
[Caroline] Go and get your trunks on.
[Caroline] For our final house,
we've cometo the south-east corner of Spain.
The arid landscape herehas been the backdrop
for many spaghetti westerns.
It's very no-nonsense, this landscape,isn't it?
It is.
[Piers] We’ve heard about three sisters
who asked their architectsto create an elegant rural getaway
out in what feels like
the middle of nowhere.
[Caroline] Hang on, slow down, slow down.
That's it.
That is it.
[Caroline] The architects here
were tasked with creating a family homefor communal living.
But each of the three familiesalso wanted their own private space.
The result?
Three separate homes
linked by a shared courtyard.
A mini village
that cleverly gives the sistersall they asked for.
[Piers] This is the least preciousextraordinary home in Spain, isn’t it?
I mean, this is... beautiful,
but actually really basicat the same time.
I mean, this is much more open, of course,this side. It faces the view, the light;
it’s away from the road.
[Caroline] Now,
it makes sensethat it's for three different families.
-Each family, each sister...-Yeah.
has her own sort of dining areaout in the sun.
They all seem to have a little place to go
and eat and relax in the sun.
This is the living side of the house,I suppose.
The building blocks are very simple.
They are all mono pitches,all have single pitches,
no complexity in the building blocks,
but the way they’re put togethermakes the spaces.
[Piers] A more conventional arrangementwould have been
to set the houses in a simple row...
but by creating a courtyard,
there's always a shady retreatfrom the desert temperatures.
All three houses havea private outside space
and a roof terraceoff the master bedroom upstairs.
Downstairs, the layouts are similarwith a kitchen dining room,
living room and two bedrooms.
All are clad in local rough sawn pine
which helps it blend inwith the colours of the landscape.
This is a timber building on the outside
and what's interesting isthat timber isn't the Spanish way.
They don't really maketimber-framed buildings.
So of course on the insideit's all masonry,
the structure is masonry
and it's actually really beautiful,
because it's madein a very rudimentary way.
The virtue of this building is that
it's really ordinary
and any contractor around here couldmake it out of stuff they already have,
using techniques that they already know.
And I think that is its beauty,it's really down to earth.
[Caroline] One of the things I really loveabout this,
the first of the houses that I’ve seen,
is that there’s nothing preciousabout it at all.
This is a house where people really live.
[Caroline] It was important to the sisters
that they each have a private home.
A lovely...
little girl’s bedroom.
The women jointly run
a successful fashion business togetherin the city.
Here they retreat,
each to their ownpersonalised living space.
They are protectedfrom their other sisters'
sort of eating area, or patio,or whatever you want to call it.
And then, they get their own stretchof this fantastic mountain scape.
Just to spend time
with their little bit of a family,with their children.
What have you found?
[Piers]What I’ve found is the village square.
I mean, here we are standingin that square that...
-Indeed....is in a way,
the most important spacein a village, isn’t it?
And this is where I suppose, here,
but also in those villages,
people cometo eat, great, meet, drink;
and also here I feelprotected from the mountains
and from the wind that must rattlethrough here on occasion.
And the kids will be playing here,dogs will be sleeping in the sun,
snapping at flies.
I mean, it’s great, isn't it? I love it.
[Caroline] Later the courtyard will befull of friends and family.
But there's time for a local tipple
with the three sisters.
Maria Angeles, Renee
and Minuca.
Why particularly did you build your househere on this piece of land?
My father has some land here and then
we decided to build a house.
I always said in this piece of landwe will build a house in the future.
-Even when you were little you said that?-Yes.
I don’t know why but we had this dream
and five years ago,
well, six years ago,we decide to build, to build the dream.
Was it your dream too, Renee?
-Was that your dream?-Yes.
Because we spent
our summer holidaysin, very close to here
where our grandparents were.
And we were together in a very big housewith all our cousins.
We were around 20 cousins.
And we said we want our kidsto do the same.
To grow together, love walking...
Maria, did you ever think,
"I don’t want to live with my sistersall the time, I’ll live on my own"?
-Yes.-[laughing]
Then we are really practical
and then we decide to make,with the architect,
you know, the shape of these houses,
but we have a, you know,
we have our door
-and also we have outside space.-Balcony.
-Yes, balconies.-They're private.
You don’t see another one.
No, I’ve noticed that.You can’t see your sister.
Who has the best house?
-They are the same.-For me,
it’s mine. For her it’s--
For me, it's mine.
You have a wonderful life here.
-Salud.-Salud.
Don't you? Salud.
Thank you.
[sisters] Yeah, it's very good.
[Piers] It's obvious the sistersare really happy with the layout.
The architects rose to the challengein a very creative way
and I want to find outhow they went about the process
of responding to a really complex brief.
[Piers] There’s a very nice balancebetween the private space,
but also the communal space,
the other side, the village square,you know.
-That---With the kitchen
looking at the common space.
We were sure about
the cortijos,
which is the Spanish wordfor these rural houses,
and we tried to translate something
of this way of living
to this house.
And these traditional houses
always have a courtyard in the centre
and all the houses look at this courtyard.
[Piers] So this surelyis the essence of this house,
hearing kids' voices
and hearing the sort of freedomthat they have,
because in a lot of contemporary houses,
things are fairly controlled,
but not here.
[male architect] No, not at all.
Maybe it’s kind of philosophy,
so the houses for them, it’s not--
And it’s for life and life is not like…
No.
[Caroline] Simple rustic design.
-Hi.-Hi.
To give these fabulous womenwhat they love;
quality family time.
[Caroline] For me,this is what architecture is all about.
About creating place for family,
for friends to spend time together.
-Do you feel that?-I do. I mean, I think,
architecture that doesn’t havepeople in it isn’t really architecture,
you know, it’s just...
-Buildings?-Static buildings.
But I think that, you know,
for people to be able to use buildingsin such an unprecious way
with kids running around,things everywhere,
that's perfect, really.
Thank you so much for having us here.
It’s been lovely to meet you.You’ve all been delightful.
Thank you.
Cheers. Salud.
-Salud.-Salud.
Salud.
[Piers] And the architects,we should drink to the architects as well.
Not the architects.
Okay.
Yeah.
[C] Our Spanish architectural adventurehas been a revelation.
We've seen some extraordinaryexperimental homes.
From a high art masterpiecethat speaks to the landscape
to an heroic suburban family home.
[Piers]In many ways, we've even seen the future.
This country can be daring and brave,
but perhaps most excitingly,
it's pushingthe boundaries of architecture.
Subtitle translation by Metia Bethell