House in structural masonry and reinforced concrete — Casa AM

The single-family house in Monte Buey, Córdoba, was designed to be built in stages: the main structure first, followed by the garage, one of the bedrooms and the rear gallery in later phases. The structural design had to anticipate these additions from the outset, so that each stage could be built without altering or compromising what had already been completed.

Understanding the problem

MV Ingeniería was engaged by ARQMAS Studio, the architecture practice responsible for the project, to develop the structural design and calculations for the foundations and structure, together with BIM modelling and the corresponding technical documentation. The house is arranged over a single storey, with a covered floor area of 230 m² and a further 60 m² of semi-covered space once all planned stages are complete.

The phased nature of the project introduced a specific constraint: the structure built in the first stage had to allow for the loads, supports and continuities required to accommodate the garage, the additional bedroom and the gallery at a later date, without requiring demolition, remedial reinforcement or significant disruption to the house while in use.

Two further elements called for particular analysis: a slab cantilevering approximately 1 metre at the front, crowned by a parapet-type beam in exposed concrete, and a cantilevered gallery with no intermediate support, built in steel framing.

Solution adopted

The base structural system — structural masonry combined with reinforced concrete — was decided by the owner and the architecture practice before MV Ingeniería's involvement. Structural design work therefore concentrated on resolving two technical decisions within that system.

At the front, a slab cantilevers approximately 1 metre; along its edge sits a parapet-type beam, 60 centimetres high, in exposed concrete. Together they required careful reinforcement design to control cracking and achieve a clean finish, since the element remains exposed with no subsequent cladding. The reinforcement was resolved through longitudinal bars combined with smaller-diameter stirrups, distributed according to the constructional detail of the section.

The cantilevered gallery, spanning 4 metres with no intermediate column, was resolved in steel framing. Its design had to account for deflection under load and for the connection with the masonry and reinforced concrete structure, to ensure structural continuity between systems with markedly different behaviour.

Phased construction was built into the calculation model as a cross-cutting criterion: each structural element was sized to account for both the configuration of the first stage and the loads and connections that later stages would introduce.

Result

The complete structural project — including foundations, ground-floor structure, roof and the planned stages of extension — was developed in full through BIM modelling, together with the corresponding technical documentation. The total quantities for the structure amount to 87 m³ of concrete and 8,300 metres of reinforcing steel, summed across all diameters used.

At the time of publication, the project is at executive design stage, prior to the start of construction.