Andrea and I did not know any architects. Fortunately, our friends and family in Cuenca knew a handful, and the time to hire one had come. We had a list of about 5 architects we wanted to meet, and Andrea set up appointments for us throughout the coming weeks. We discussed our desires in a house at each meeting and asked questions about common mistakes in construction or design, average cost to build a home per square meter, and what aspects of building each architect thought was important. And, excluding price, we received very similar answers from every architect, each one, I’m sure, a very accomplished and well-studied professional. But these similar answers sounded a bit different when coming from one of the architects. His name was Marco. A 50-something with an office in the center of Paute, the nearest city to our land. And something unspoken came with each of his answers. Firstly, a whimsical enjoyment in being able to share his knowledge with a naive couple in need of a professional in his craft. Then, a duty that drove him to educate us where dollars make the biggest impact in construction when it comes to avoiding future problems. And finally, a cool, composed, and self-assured manner that foreshadowed when problems eventually do arise, we would have someone that, from experience, was levelheaded and prepared to find solutions. After 2 weeks of appointments, Andrea and I, without much discussion, knew Marco was our guy.

Side Note: My Spanish is not great. I can handle the everyday interactions well, like shopping, asking for and receiving basic directions, and casual conversations. But, certain situations are filled with words that are not commonly used, which can lead me to struggle a bit. This is common when I go to the doctor, or dentist, or if I am searching for specific hardware for a home project. The language used to describe things in these scenarios is not commonly used in day-to-day speaking, so I don’t have a lot of exposure to these words. I have learned to prepare myself though. In situations like this, I often go with a list of pretranslated words, pictures, and/or my own scribbled drawings to help in communicating effectively. This would prove to be the case when it came to describing the house we wanted.

Once Andrea and I had shared our identical opinions of Marco with one another, she made the phone call to schedule a follow-up meeting on our land with Marco. He wanted to see the features of the land in person, and I knew this was the perfect time to start communicating the more comprehensive necessities we had in a home. Now, at this point, Andrea, my mom, and I had more than a year of time to share and discuss house ideas with each other. More-or-less, I had the abstract ideas of what our house needed in my head, but with an almost complete lack of ability to communicate this in words to Marco. I needed to make a drawing. So, completely ignorant to home esthetics and design reason, I produced this to help convey our home needs:

I know it’s not the best, and yes, I drew it in Paint. But it would be the seed we could give to Marco that he could then grow into something beautiful and functional. My apologies, for probably obvious reasons, my notations on the drawing were done in Spanish, but I will give a brief description.

You are looking at a two story house, first floor on the left, second floor on the right. The large square with hatch marks is an outdoor patio, above that is the entrance to the house. Here is the foyer of the house with a closet and a space for the internet, networking, and security equipment. To the left is a living room connected to two bedrooms. This is intended to be a private space for my mom and mother-in-law. Ahead is the guest bathroom on the right, a guest bedroom on the left, and extra space enforcing the notion that I have no idea how the fuck to draw a house. From that guest bedroom, take a right and curve around through the primary living room, passing stairs to the second floor, and entering into the kitchen/dining area with an island. This has a walk-in pantry and continues on to a utility area. The utility area holds a second fridge, washer and dryer, storage, and a sink area. There are more exits to the patio, as well as a half bathroom for guests and a storage closet.

Upstairs starts with a banistered overlook of the primary living room. Down the hall to the left is a bedroom, nursery/bedroom, two offices, and a full bath. As well as the master bedroom with a walk-through closet and bathroom with tub and shower. To the far right side is two studios, positioned accordingly to take advantage of a view from Villaflor. This would be space for my mom to do her crafts and my wife to dance/exercise.

Ok, that’s the rough vision of the house we have and everything we gave to Marco. After a week, Marco got back to us and presented his interpretation of a functioning home using as much of my drawing as possible. We spent another week on small revisions and arrived at a final drawing for the house. Below I have attached the drawings. It is a two-story, 3,100 square foot, 6 bedroom, 5½ bath home with two living rooms and four office/studio spaces.

First Floor

Second Floor