Peaceful housing under patronage of Saint Mary

This historic town has a strong physical context and is found in the outskirts of a man-made lake. Our site is located a hundred yards from the church of Santa Maria Ahuacatlán, a colonial church that dates back to the XVI century.

The project was conceived as a weekend retreat from Mexico City´s busy lifestyle and includes 9 town houses, a main terrace, a yoga studio, a massage room, parking space and the services needed to provide an almost hotel-like experience. The overall footage of the project is 2,269.00 sq mts and each of the town houses range between 168.10 and 251.27 sq mts.

When confronted with such a beautiful and restricted context, we could do nothing but respect it and from such respect we tried to handle the physical aspects of the project with care. Most of this aspects were given to us as restrictions by the local authority: the materials involved, the heights, the relationship with other buildings, the general layout, sizes of doors and windows, etc.

From such care of the physical aspects of the project we tried to find the spirit and aspirations of the place, and bring them to a next stage of evolution where the new structure respectfuly talks about the past, is firmly rooted in the present and gives a sense of direction for the future.

Hierve is a small multidisciplinary design firm created in 1999 by Alejandro Villarreal, with the purpose to serve society through high quality architectural, product design, visual arts and the development of business model projects.

The word “Hierve” (boiling), derives from the active, moving and dynamic properties of any liquid at its boiling state, from our continual need to create and irradiate ideas, concepts and projects.

The word “Diseñeria” (designery), is a self invented word describing that design is the main activity of our business, just as it is used in a “bakery”, “carpentry” or “smithery”.

Our mission

To ignite, burst, stretch, fold, mold, juggle, bounce, bake, suction, open, connect, expand, and liberate creativity, with the main purpose of inducing it into the world, to produce some change, benefit, improvement, evolution and liberation

Our team

Villarreal, Alejandro (principal)

Acle, Alfredo 2000 – 2002
Altamirano, Gabriela 2003
Casares, Andrés 2007 – 2008
Costa-Laurent, Fatima 2004
García Crespo, Arturo 2007, 2008, 2009
Martínez, Victor 2002 – 2003
Merodio, Mikel 2005
Novelo, Denisse 2008 – 2009
Niño de Rivera, Armando 2002 – 2005
Ramirez, Jesús 2004 – 2006, 2008 – 2010
Ramirez, Sugey 2002 – 2008
Ramirez Corzo, Cecilia 1999 – 2002
Rosas, Gabriela 2006, 2008 – 2010