OFF GRID
Green roofs, oculi and a maths-inspired layout add up to a unique retreat within a private estate on Greek island Milos PHOTOGRAPHY: YIORGIS YEROLYMBOS WRITER: ELLIE STATHAKI
A decade ago, the Athens-based practice Deca Architecture received an enquiry about one of its projects, a house on the tiny Greek island of Antiparos. A visitor to the island was looking for a holiday home in the Aegean, and was impressed by the design strength and quality of Deca’s work. It was the start of a conversation that would lead to one of the studio’s most extensive projects to date: a villa on an 87,000 sq m site on the Cycladic island of Milos. Based in Athens’ chic Kolonaki neighbourhood, Deca was founded in 2001 by Peru-born Greek Alexandros Vaitsos and Mexican Carlos Loperena, who met while studying architecture at the University of California, Berkeley. Their work is rooted in an intellectual rigour that means that even the most seemingly carefree commission – such as this holiday home – involves site-specific research and rich layers of conceptual narrative. Their plans for the Milos site drew on the Voronoi diagram, a mathematical formula,
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defined by 19th century mathematician Georgy Voronoi, that is used to partition geometric planes into organic grids. Using this method, the practice created the limestone-clad Immersion Corral residence for its client, and so the story of Voronoi’s Corrals, as the whole development is now known, began. Deca went on to add three other guest houses to the estate: Orchard Corral, set in the island’s largest olive grove; the bijou, hand-built Isolation Corral; and Preservation Corral, set in a fruit grove. The word ‘corral’ in the projects’ names signifies a sort of natural barrier, explain the architects. ‘The site is so extensive that it contained within it both areas of wilderness that have an incredible biodiversity, as well as productive agricultural land,’ says Loperena. ‘The corrals define the boundary between these two environments for their mutual protection.’ Three years ago, the client turned to Deca again, asking for a large guest house, the biggest building È
Above, the new Hourglass Corral villa features exposed concrete beams that cantilever beyond the stone façade to create shading canopies. Its gardens and green roofs are planted with a selection of Mediterranean species used to produce essential oils Right, a bird’s-eye view of the 87,000 sq m Milos site, with, from top, the Hourglass Corral, Isolation Corral, Preservation Corral and Orchard Corral guest houses, and the site’s main residence, the clifftop Immersion Corral