Feb 2, 20222 min read

Monkey House (Casa Macaco): Inspired By The Verticality Of The Forest _ Atelier Marko Brajovic

Brazil _ Casa Macaco (Monkey House): Inspired By The Verticality Of The Forest _ Atelier Marko Brajovic

A few years ago the monkeys that lived at the foot of Serra disappeared. It was told that it was due to yellow fever that supposedly spread among the primate families. I don't know, we were very sad.

At the beginning of this year, the day we started thinking about a house that connects to the magnitude of the trees, there they appeared.

A family of Capuchin Monkeys, a complete tribe! They were back and taught us the way of why, where, and how to do the project.

The Monkey House was inspired by the verticality of the forest, in the possibility of approaching the crests of the trees, in a gentle and subtle way, connecting with its countless inhabitants of the kingdom of flora and fauna.

Monkey House structure works synergistically between wooden components all of the same profile, covered by galvalume skin and thermoacoustic insulation. Monkey House was assembled in an area of secondary forest, installed between trees, occupying a small area of 5m x 6m, thus creating zero interference in the local vegetation with a total area of 86m2. The perception of the forest is vertical. The horizon is inverted, following the flow of energy, matter, and information on the growth of trees to lead us in the search for energy, sunlight.

The best design solutions already exist in Nature.

For 3.8 billion years, life creates elegant solutions in intelligence and simplicity.

In order to design the support structure of the Monkey House, we were observing which plants were better adapted to the topography of the land and which strategies were adopted to allow stability in height growth.

The juçara or içara (Euterpe edulis) in Tupi, is an endemic palm of the Atlantic Forest which is structured through props roots, adapting itself to the downhill terrain and distributing the dynamic weight on multiple vectors ensuring stability for the thin and very tall stalk.

For the Monkey House project, we implemented the same strategy, creating a series of thin and dense pillars, inspired by the Adventist morphology of the juçara palm roots, thus ensuring stability in this vertical typology construction.

When we thought about the landscape design the statement was the complete reforestation with endemic plants, which we consider is a priority in Brazil and worldwide.

As well, conducting local plants' growth around the house proposes a state of immersion of the house and the humans into the wild.

The top floor of Casa Macaco is an observatory. A place of encounter and reunion, to observe Nature outside and inside us, to learn and relate in a regenerative way.