The idea of serving prison time isn’t usually on an architect’s mind. But when César Becerra, a partner at 51-1 Arquitectos, in Lima, Peru, describes the constraints his firm encountered while designing a house in the city’s San Isidro district, one of the first things he says is, “If we’d harmed any of the property’s four olive trees, we could have gone to jail!”

No ordinary trees, these centuries-old specimens are part of “Bosque El Olivar,” a grove descended from saplings the conquistadores brought from Spain in the 1500s. The surviving 24 acres, now mostly public park, are protected. But that wasn’t the only restriction on the 4,682-square-foot site. Since 2010, new houses in the neighborhood have had to adhere to a very short list of imported revival styles, most notably Tudor, which predominates here, with its half-timber facades.

“Nowhere else in the entire country has a mandatory architectural style, and Tudor is the most alien one imaginable,” says 51-1 partner Manuel de Rivero, explaining that Lima gets almost no rain, making steeply pitched roofs unnecessary and trees—or wood construction—rare. “But in the early twentieth century, across South America,” he continues, “Tudor became the style of important families—of prestige, status, wealth.” And that trend shaped this neighborhood, which began as an elegant, upper-class residential district in the 1920s.

Initially deterred by the dictate, the architects soon warmed to the challenge of reinterpreting Tudor in a modern spirit and reclaiming the style as an expression of structure. The site, surrounded by the historic parkland, also intrigued them. Long before the conquistadores arrived, a pre-Incan people had developed the area for agriculture, fed by irrigation channels they created. Even today, its leafy forest is anomalous in Lima’s stark, desert climate.

In the living room, a Ghost sofa by Paola Navone for Gervasoni joins a lounge chair and ottoman by Hay. The Beni Ourain rug is from Mascarpone Originale, and the coffee table is by Primas." layout="bleed" credit="Photo by Cristóbal Palma" photoUserId="6133432645968617472"/>

Those same qualities had inspired the client, Luciano Bedoya, an insurance executive (and avid pianist) to scoop up the property when it became available. He and his future wife, Liya Moya, imagined raising children here. But the existing house—an unremarkable Tudor cottage that they never occupied—couldn’t become the four-bedroom home they envisioned. Severely restricting the house’s allowable footprint were the olive trees—each requiring a 360-degree five-foot clearance—plus an obligatory 10-foot lot-line setback.

The architects soon realized, however, that below or semi-below grade, they could legally build out to the boundaries. The resulting 3,548-square-foot “upside-down" scheme partially submerges the bedrooms underground while elevating the main living/dining/kitchen spaces in a hovering, neo-Tudor, second-story volume.

“We didn’t think we’d use the terrace that often, but it’s become our barbecue spot and a great social space.”
—Luciano Bedoya, resident

Sandwiched in between is an outdoor terrace, just above ground level, with a swimming pool and muscular concrete piers that support the top story. The design may appear acrobatic, but, says Becerra, “nothing about it was capricious.”

Given the luxury of a forest here, he adds, “the house needed to reveal different ways of experiencing the trees.” So the main living spaces overlook the tree canopy, while the bedrooms offer worm’s eye views into the foliage.

The partially cantilevered upper level, seemingly afloat over the olive grove, appears half-timbered—but with a difference. Clean-edged steel replaces traditional wood beams, providing seismic resiliency—a necessity in this earthquake-prone region—that was not achievable with similarly sized wood timbers. (The infill panels are high-density polystyrene foam.)

Inside, the second story is lined with exposed pine plywood, giving its walls and vaulted ceiling—the four-gabled roof’s complex underside—warm tones and a playful feel. Precision-detailed like fine cabinetry, this utilitarian material takes on a refined character.

The soaring living/dining area is broad and column free, with views through four exposures. Luciano’s grand piano occupies a place of honor, as does the generous dining table. “Liya’s mother is Russian,” he says, “so there’s a tradition of long meals with lots of family.”

The dining area flows into the kitchen, which features custom plywood cabinets and a patterned Spanish tile floor. Next door is a workspace, where Liya, a professional photographer, can edit photographs at home near their children, now five and three.

From a distance, the house appears to be a traditional Tudor." layout="wide" credit="Photo by Cristóbal Palma" photoUserId="6133432645968617472"/>

By placing the bedrooms semi-below grade, the architects addressed competing needs for privacy, daylight, and views. The garden terraces down to the principal suite’s sliding-glass doors, which usher in abundant light, but even the smaller windows in the other bedrooms do an adequate job of illuminating the spaces. With Lima’s year-round cloud cover evenly diffusing sunshine, the lower level is rarely in shadow.

As for neighborhood reactions to this unorthodox “Tudor,” Luciano recalls a telling moment: “Soon after we moved in, someone slipped a letter under our door. It said: ‘If you ever want to sell your house, please let me know.’”

House in the Grove

The timeline of a neighborhood

c. 500 AD: An Indigenous people construct irrigation canals for agriculture, creating an oasis in the desert.
1532–1535: The conquistadores arrive from Spain and found the city of Lima.
c. 1560: The conquistadores bring more than 100 olive saplings. Only three survive the journey, but they multiply by the thousands into an olive grove in the city’s historically agricultural section, later becoming the Bosque El Olivar (Olive Grove Forest).
1920s–1940s: The nearly 400-year-old grove is preserved in Lima’s urban expansion in the 1920s. During the next two decades, European Revival styles, including Tudor, proliferate among the elite across South America—including in this neighborhood.
1959: El Olivar is declared a protected National Monument.
2010: New regulations make the choice of five revival styles—half-timbered Tudor and Basque, French, English, and neo-Colonial—mandatory for any new houses here.
2010–2011: Luciano Bedoya purchases a Tudor cottage within El Olivar and engages César Becerra, Manuel de Rivero, and Fernando Puente Arnao of 51-1 Arquitectos to create a home for his future family.
2016: 51-1 completes Tudor House.

Project Credits:

Architect of Record: 51-1 Arquitectos / @51_1_arquitectos

Structural Engineering: GCAQ

Civil Engineering: Jose Luis Ypanaque

Landscape Design: LuisCamacho

Lighting Design: Claudia PazLighting / @claudia_paz_lighting_studio

Decoration: Augusta Pastor

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