Indonesia has thousands of islands with multicultural traditions that embellish every corner of the island. Every city holds different custom and characteristic that distinguish them from one another, but it doesn’t necessarily belong to one. Taking this architecture project as an example, the owner wanted to bring the Balinese architecture in to the City of Rain, Bogor, in West Java. Although Balinese architecture is influenced by ancient Javanese elements, this centuries-old style of design is also heavily influenced by Bali’s Hindu traditions making it very distinctly unique as well as appropriate in the highland of Bogor.
This private weekend house nestled amidst the beautiful nature of Bogor. Living in a big city, the owners yearned for relaxing exclusive retreat surrounded by nature and tranquility. The location is hidden from the buzzling crowd of the city but is still reachable. It was built for their weekend getaway when they want to spend peaceful quality time with their family and friends. Hence we designed the house to be spacious with a lot of features to maximize the user convenient and comfort, such as large living room and dining room, a greenhouse for gardening and a reading/lounging corner.
In a 3 hectares area comprise of rice fields and plantation land, the buildings stand amid the stunning surrounding of pine forest and a crystal clear river. Because of its amazing view, we wanted to preserve the nature and keep the building area just enough to accommodate all the needs. We built the house on less than 10% of the whole area. The house was also built on a mound land area where it used to be an existing building, without ruining the agricultural land. The owner wanted to keep the rice fields and most of the existing plantation and trees as they are so the land workers can still work on the agricultural.
Although the owners are not originated from Bali, they take a huge interest in Balinese culture. As a result we designed the building very much influenced by the Balinese architecture style. Like on most houses in Bali, we implemented some of the Balinese building’s characteristics. We implemented pepalihan, a form of stair-like shape arranged repeatedly in three levels upward or downward that function as a design feature. Another feature is Balinese houses’ exposed ceiling, where we can see the wooden roof structure (usuk).
Following the concept, we applied materials that are commonly found in the Balinese structures, such kerobokan paras stone for the walls, exposed red bricks and sirap roof from ironwood. For the roof, we employed knockdown roof structures that we brought over from Bali. Most of the materials used to construct the buildings were carried straight from Bali so they would really give the authentic feels. The artworks also take on Balinese characteristic with wooden statues and a lot of carvings.
Surrounded by beautiful lush greeneries and trees, we designed a lot of opening for the buildings. Each building has big windows and door glasses for view purposes and as a direct access to the nature. These openings also allow light and air to circulate into the building. The establishment of Balinese style houses in West Java landscape is just one of the displays of the harmonious diversity of Indonesia architectural culture. We could not be anymore pleased than to project Balinese architecture style in a land outside the Island of Bali.