Franca Apartment
FRANCA APARTMENT
Ana Sawaia Arquitetura
ARCHITECTS
Ana Sawaia Arquitetura
GENERAL CONSTRUCTION
Rg Plan
LANDSCAPE DESIGN
Bruno Moreno
MANUFACTURERS
Baraúna, By Kamy, Carbono, Dpot, Estúdio Bola, Etel, Novo ambiente, Paulo Alves Design, casarte marcenaria, reka iluminacao
COORDINATION
Ana Sawaia
AREA
241 m²
YEAR
2025
LOCATION
São Paulo, Brazil
CATEGORY
Residential Architecture, Apartment Interiors
English description provided by the architects.
Located in the Jardins neighborhood of São Paulo, this apartment occupies the first floor of a building designed by Sérgio Ambrogini in 1973.
The current intervention builds upon a previous renovation, carried out in 2021 by Studio Lak, from which some elements were preserved.
The large span of the living room, 7.5 meters free of central columns, suggested the possible presence of a ribbed slab, which was confirmed only after the ceiling was removed.
The decision was then made to leave the slab exposed, revealing the concrete texture and the wooden formwork marks from the original casting.
Lighting was handled in a subtle manner: a strip of indirect light with spot fixtures runs along the length of the room, while a white shelf with an integrated LED profile follows the window frames of the balcony, which can be fully opened to merge the interior and exterior spaces.
Set back from the street and facing the tree canopy, the apartment benefits from abundant natural light throughout the day.
The dining room, with a lower ceiling height due to the air-conditioning units, was painted white to contrast with the exposed concrete slab.
In the kitchen, the previous petrol-blue cabinetry was replaced with gray vinyl finishes, resulting in a calmer and more neutral atmosphere.
The shelving unit, designed by Paulo Alves, is one of the project’s highlights: it is anchored to the wall at only three points, where the plywood boxes are fixed.
The shelves attach to these boxes and remain detached from the wall by 2 centimeters, allowing ventilation, cable passage, and a sense of lightness.
The project balances the beauty of the original structure, now revealed, with technical solutions that update the apartment for contemporary living.
