Budget Breakdown: This $167K Chilean Prefab Isn’t Your Typical Surf Shack
"Quality was controlled to the maximum," says architect Nataša Stanaćev. "The result is a home with finishes that are—I would say—almost luxurious, yet achieved without the use of luxury materials."
"Quality was controlled to the maximum," says architect Nataša Stanaćev. "The result is a home with finishes that are—I would say—almost luxurious, yet achieved without the use of luxury materials."
This compact coastal cabin in Matanzas, a village on Chile’s craggy central coast, is not your typical prefab. It was designed by Stanaćev Granados, an architecture duo known for their highly expressive minimalist residences, and it was built at a nearby workshop by an independent contractor and his three trusted workers. In other words, the endeavor was unusually bespoke. But it did achieve the client’s goal of reducing the cost and time of traditional construction.
"This was a fun project because it was an attempt at prefabrication, which is a very industrial process, but it became something very boutique," says architect Nataša Stanaćev, who helms Stanaćev Granados with Manuel Granados, her partner and husband.
This 376-square-foot cabin in Matanzas, a rugged coastal area of Chile popular among kite surfers, was designed by local studio Stanaćev Granados.
Photo: Manuel Granados
The story began with a forested 1-acre plot on a hill with distant views of the Pacific. Raúl Castellazzi, an Argentine tech professional based in Santiago, had bought it for $67,000 about a decade earlier. "I fell in love with the place," he says of Matanzas. "I thought it was magical to have the sea, hills, and forests, all together." As a single guy and avid kitesurfer, he imagined building a basic crash pad for weekend trips from the city.
He initially considered a prebuilt tiny house, but his neighbor, an engineer and contractor named Florent Dromard, proposed a more custom option: fabricating timber panels at his workshop and assembling them on-site. Florent’s friends at Stanaćev Granados could design the structure. "I knew how innovative they were, and since Florent enjoyed working with them, it seemed like the perfect trifecta," says Raúl.
The homeowner, Raúl Castellazzi, is a young tech professional who wanted a simple place to crash during his frequent trips from Santiago to the sea.
Photo: Manuel Granados
Knowing that the goal was to build something very small and affordable, the architects drew a 370-square-foot lofted cabin made almost entirely of plywood panels. The panels were cut to specification at Dromard’s workshop, a modest space that barely accommodated the larger pieces. Once on-site, they were glued to the timber framing—there are no visible screws or nails—to create a seamless look.
The interior of the cabin, with its 19-foot-tall pitched ceiling, is covered in plywood panels that were glued to the structure’s wood frame—no nails or screws—to achieve a clean, seamless look.
Photo: Manuel Granados
See the full story on Dwell.com: Budget Breakdown: This $167K Chilean Prefab Isn’t Your Typical Surf Shack
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