41°10’05.5″N 0°58’26.8″E. Riudecols is on a sloppy side of a big creek valley, facing south. Its houses sit on this slope in such a way that their front and back street are in two different floors.

This is the case of the old house where Lidia wanted to live: it has two entrances in two floors. The big inhabitable space is on the third floor.

This orographical characteristic has brought narrow streets, parallel to the hill, where sunlight has trouble getting in. The old cinema is facing a square, where the entrance is, which allows air and light to come in from the east. The main entrance is on this square, which could become a place for Lidia to spend time outdoors, by herself or with friends.

While inside the big dark volume we found on our first visit, we were equally worried and excited: although the structure of the building was in good shape, its physiology was far from inhabitable. But it was a place full of possibilities, even with a very low budget.

Before becoming a cinema, this used to be the town’s lodge. Its 1480 m3 upper floor volume where hosts used to sleep or watch movies had all of its windows blocked. It was a huge dark space.

The materials we use have to be light, easy to move in and transform, cheap and durable. Wood seems an obvious choice.

1. To cure the building. Reinforce the structure where necessary.
2. To improve thermal comfort. To find a mechanism to make indoor air inhabitable. It is not feasible to build a single climate with 1480 m3.
3. To lighten the construction. The change from inn to cinema left all windows walled. We reopen them to let light back in.

The proposal arises from two premises: to safeguard Lidia’s health and economy. How to live in this old cinema feeling well (to get a good sunlight dose, not to get cold in winter, to rest…) and spending the minimum money (during the construction process and after that)?

Josep Maria, the carpenter, built a first prototype in order to check the time it would take him to build all the rooms, and to give a more precise and fair price. It ended up being faster than he had first foreseen.

So to keep the budget as low as possible, Lidia helped the carpenter and his son in the assembly and varnishing of all the wood panels.

In January 2010, four years after Lidia had moved in, we invited José Hevia to document how she was inhabiting that place together with her partner Xavi.

When Lidia moved in, the house was not finished yet. The carpenter was still working in the attic structure. This house, as all houses, is never finished. Lidia and Xavi keep transforming it according to their needs and possibilities.

In 2007 we lent her a videocamera and she recorded her life for a whole day:

In August 2011 Lidia called us back. She wanted to build a new living room, turn her former studio into a guests room, and build a closet in the old living room, which would become their new studio. She asked us for some simple plans to guide them with sizes and the positions of things like doors. As they already had some experience from when they helped the carpenter, they built these new structures themselves and they cost less than 2500 euros.

In 2008, almost three years after Lidia had moved in, we asked her to draw her experience so far in the house. We presented these drawings at a young architect´s congress in Valencia. This is the result: