Osler House – located on the northern extremity of Brasília’s pilot plan, at the tip of one of the branches of Paranoá Lake – releases the approach to formal modern language from the colonial dimension, yet present in Du Plessis House (2001-2003).

If the projects prior to Gama Issa House had already signaled this trajectory, it is with Osler House that the admiration for projects by Oscar Niemeyer, Lucio Costa, Affonso Eduardo Reidy among others of that generation, is assumed and become literal. The abstract modern references acquire personality in the quotation of an essentially Brazilian modernism of the 30’s and 60’s with its pilotis and perpendicular volumes.

Interestingly, this happens in a project in Brasília, as if the location context and site visits had delineated not only architectural design approaches of this house but also the professional practice of mk27 in the following years.

In fact, the Osler House was never finished. The client – a UN official always on peace missions around the world – built the house intermittently throughout the years. Photos taken in 2009 depict one of the many construction endings, but some elements such as the brises on the upper floor were never built.

On the ground floor there is a bedroom, bathroom, utility area and the garage, as well as a panel by Athos Bulcão designed especially for the circulation hall. The upper volume is supported on pilotis that do not reach the first floor and the roof slab.

This solution kept living room floor free of any structural element.

Gabriel Kogan