# Studio Toggle Architects: Architecture · Urbanism · Activism — Kuwait \& Porto

> Multi\-award winning architecture studio\. Architizer A\+ Award — Best Architecture Firm, Middle East \& Africa\. Architecture · Urbanism · Activism\. Offices in Kuwait City and Porto\.

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## Pages
- [Contact]()
- [About]()
- [Instagram Feed]()
- [JOBS]()
- [WORK]()

## Portfolio
- [CHALETS IN BNAIDER]()
- [HOUSE IN MISHREF](): Presenting a clean and serene façade to the street, the resulting massing manifests as a white monolithic volume poised elegantly on top of a stone cladded podium\. Rhythmic arrangement of louvered windows across the façade softens the volume by lending it a sense of lightness\.

The house is organized around an internal courtyard cutting across all the floors\. The U\-shaped volume faces this courtyard in an Omani stone clad skin\. The courtyard and the void results in an inward\-looking typology that can benefit from maximum diffused daylight without compromising on privacy\. The house, thus, opens up towards the interior featuring a private courtyard lined with citrus trees and a sculptural fountain reminiscent of the gardens from the Moorish Alcazars\.

The 4\-story courtyard and void presented a question of human scale as well as connectivity between the living units facing each other\. A large suspended stair is key to an architectural promenade that sweeps through all the floors, offering vantage points and ease of access\.

The interiors of the house features a simple palette of ethereal white and natural woods\. The straight and minimal lines of the massing is offset with the sleek curves of spiral staircases\. The furniture is carefully chosen and boldly contrasted against the serene ambience\. The calming sound of the water and the diffused light filtered through the louvered windows make this house an oasis of tranquility in this busy Kuwaiti suburb\.
- [Rawda Radiance](): The villa's facade features a composition of white plaster, stone cladding, and strategically placed louvres, providing shading and respite from Kuwait's harsh desert sun while adding elegance to the building's exterior\.

The villa is elevated on a travertine plinth, an architectural choice that extends its presence into the landscape\. This plinth seamlessly continues beyond the confines of the interior spaces to include an elegantly integrated swimming pool\. Strategically placed, the pool is visible from all public areas within the house, ensuring that the calming water vistas are a constant backdrop to daily life\. Additionally, the pool contributes to the home's microclimate through evaporative cooling, which lowers the surrounding temperature\. The gentle sound of water moving in the pool further enriches the ambience, cultivating a Zen\-like atmosphere throughout the property\.

The villa's travertine plinth extends outward, carving interstitial spaces that offer varying degrees of privacy depending on their location\. Public spaces, such as the living and dining areas, open directly onto the pool, while private spaces benefit from their own secluded open nooks, ensuring intimacy and seclusion\. These strategically placed interstitial spaces balance communal openness and personal retreat, contributing to a holistic design that maximizes functionality and spatial efficiency\.

Within the villa, the interior spaces are defined by a subtle material palette that complements the minimalist ethos of its exterior\. White plaster walls and travertine floors dominate the scene, creating a serene and luminous canvas, with abundant natural light enhancing the spatial experience\.

This sense of openness is further accentuated by wood accents, which introduce warmth and texture into the minimalist scheme\. Subtle lighting elements are strategically placed to highlight architectural details and create a welcoming atmosphere, ensuring that the villa's interiors exude a sense of comfort and understated elegance\.

Carefully designed balconies on the first floor increase natural light, ventilation, and exterior views, while compact planning optimizes open spaces, creating a sense of airiness and freedom\. Private areas are intentionally designed with quiet outdoor spaces, providing residents with intimate areas to unwind in privacy, enriching the villa's overall quality\.
- [EDGES APARTMENTS](): A simple rhythmic twist, achieved by transposition of the vertices on either side of a finite axis, imparts dynamism and drama to the façade\. A very restrained palette of locally sourced natural brick and exposed concrete finish further emphasizes the purity of the mass and gives the building its unique personality\.

The facade's irregular form was also influenced by practical considerations including the disruption of strong prevailing winds, and the provision of shade and privacy\. A vertical strip of aluminum louvers splits the building's frontage into two halves, denoting the divide between homes on the north and south sides of the property\. The louvers protect the central staircase from direct sunlight, but also restrict views into this glass\-lined circulation space\.

On the ground floor, an exposed lobby adjacent to the parking area provides access to the staircase, lifts and a communal gym, which faces the street and is partially shielded behind more metal louvres\. The lobby's glass\-reinforced concrete ceiling incorporates recessed lighting in an angular channel that directs residents and visitors towards the various entrances and continues the sharp lines of the facade\. Patinated concrete floor tiles coated with clear epoxy resin form a hardy surface that complements the brick\. A patio to the rear of the building accommodates a small open\-air swimming pool\.
- [LANTERN HOUSE](): Need for a balance between privacy and openness informed the design and so did climatic and environmental concerns

The swimming pool takes the centre stage and the house wraps around and opens up into it\. The large glazed walls of the ground floor create a seamless effect between the ground floor spaces and the pool\. The core idea was to use the pool to cool the interiors, as it was done in old Kuwaiti houses, and the aluminium screens around the house provide shade, as well as one\-way views towards the outside\.

The upper floor is slightly cantilevered to form overhangs above the glazed walls, minimizing the heat gain\. This arrangement is reminiscent of the traditional courtyard houses which utilized a water feature to cool the passive air through evaporation\. The simple white massing of the house is strategically ordered for optimum shading as well as the reflection of the harsh desert sun\. The two cantilevered square windows offer wrap around views as well acting as a cosy alcove floating above the pool\.

## Categories
- [News](https://ohw.204.myftpupload.com/news)
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## Tags
- [kuwait](https://ohw.204.myftpupload.com/tag/kuwait)
- [residential](https://ohw.204.myftpupload.com/tag/residential)
- [Awards](https://ohw.204.myftpupload.com/tag/awards)
- [Architizer](https://ohw.204.myftpupload.com/tag/architizer)
- [studiotoggle](https://ohw.204.myftpupload.com/tag/studiotoggle)

## Categories
- [Built](https://ohw.204.myftpupload.com/portfolio/built)
- [Unbuilt](https://ohw.204.myftpupload.com/portfolio/unbuilt)

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