Villa Tangrah is situated within a garden near the forests of Golestan, a landscape shaped over time by a succession of temporary structures, each leaving its mark on the history of the site.

Years ago, during the construction of the road connecting Gonbad to Mashhad, a small wooden cabin was built in the garden to accommodate the German engineers working on the project. Decades later, Dr. Gholam-Ali Beski constructed a brick house for his occasional stays, incorporating the original wooden cabin into the new structure.

From the beginning, the architecture of the garden had been closely intertwined with its natural setting. The northern part of the site was preserved as a habitat for native forest trees, while fruit trees were planted to the south. Nature was therefore understood not as a backdrop to architecture, but as an essential part of everyday life and inhabitation.

This relationship became the point of departure for the project: a reconsideration of temporary dwelling and an exploration of a renewed relationship between the house, its inhabitants, and the landscape.

The villa is conceived as a place for several generations to gather and spend time together—a form of seasonal inhabitation that, despite its temporary nature, calls for a quality beyond that of a conventional recreational retreat. The spatial organization is therefore structured around a balance between collective life and privacy. Shared spaces are positioned alongside areas for rest and individual retreat, allowing several generations to inhabit the house simultaneously without compromising a sense of independence and seclusion.

The climatic and natural characteristics of the site also play a central role in shaping this organization. The orientation of the spaces and openings responds to the potential for natural cross-ventilation, making use of the site’s inherent capacity to provide airflow and thermal comfort. At the same time, the placement and openness of the spaces are carefully configured to extend the surrounding landscape into the experience of the interior, allowing the natural views to become an integral part of everyday life within the house.

The project is organized across two floors and comprises two principal volumes. The residential and recreational wings are conceived as two distinct blocks positioned alongside one another and connected by a corridor. This separation extends beyond a functional division to become an integral part of the architectural form, allowing each volume to develop a spatial character appropriate to its use.

The residential block accommodates the primary spaces of everyday life, from the kitchen and dining area to the living spaces, bedrooms, and laundry. The second block houses spaces dedicated to collective activities and leisure, including a swimming pool, jacuzzi, dry sauna, gym, games room, and guest room.

The architectural form of the project is defined by a simple and direct composition of concrete and wood. The ground floor, with its concrete walls and floors, sits heavily and close to the ground, while a lightweight timber structure rests upon it to form the upper floor. Three pitched roofs clad in terracotta tiles complete the composition. Extending beyond the building’s edges, the roofs protect the house from the rain while creating shaded spaces around its perimeter.

The choice of materials and form, together with a restrained and understated architectural language, seeks to carry forward a memory that predates the project—a memory of wood, terracotta, rain, forest, and houses that once emerged in this garden for brief periods of inhabitation. Rather than positioning itself in opposition to this context, the architecture seeks to define itself as a continuation of it.

In this sense, Villa Tangrah is a house for periodic inhabitation; yet inhabiting it means more than simply occupying a building for a limited period. The project seeks to create conditions in which collective life, privacy, nature, and architecture can coexist—an architecture that does not seek to possess the land, but to become part of it.