Penghu House / XRANGE Architects

On the Penghu archipelago west of Taiwan, indigenous laogushi or coral stone houses are a unique cultural heritage. With roots in the southern Chinese coastal regions of Qing dynasty, coral stone houses were built of actual corals blocks stacked upon a base wall of basalt quarried on the islands. They are characterized by a nine-square plan, distinctive “rolled” roof ridges resembling a curved gable, and “slits and pillars” as window openings due to strong winds. For a multi-generation Penghu family, XRANGE is inspired to reinterpret these historical coral house clusters seen on windswept plains of wild chrysanthemum.