Phnom Penh, Cambodia — 2002

Anti-chamber towards Cambodian airspace or soil, the building presents itself as an intimate place, isolated from the outside, only opening onto the slopes. The whole is part of a square whose constituent elements are arranged so to create a hierarchical composition: centered, focused, symmetrical. The building has a highlight, the central space, from where the roofs, of seven different levels, extend Cascade. This strict and rigorous geometry offers clear legibility of places by creating a spatial continuum punctuated by a multiplicity of views and atmospheres. As much architectural devices directly inspired by history of Khmer architecture through an approach and a contemporary aesthetics. Light treatment, natural and artificial, aims to highlight the intrinsic qualities spaces and volumes as well as to exalt gas even of the materials used – sandstone, wood, lacquer, glass, metal.