An author-driven residential architecture remodel in Mexico City is not a renovation service. It is a design service — one that begins with a diagnosis of what the existing house is and argues for what it could become. In MÉTODO, we use the term casa de autor to describe a house where the design decisions form a coherent whole: the floor plan, the section, the material palette, the light quality, and the spatial sequence are not independent choices made from separate catalogs. They are parts of a single argument.
Applying that argument to an existing Mexico City house is the remodel challenge.
What Author-Driven Means in Practice
Author-driven architecture is not a style. It is a methodology. The architect takes responsibility for the design position — proposing a specific interpretation of the site, the program, and the material context — and defends it through the process. The client is not a passive approver; they participate in refining the position through structured dialogue and the options matrix.
The difference from conventional renovation:
- A conventional renovation starts with a list of things to fix and finishes to replace. An authored remodel starts with a question: what is this house trying to be?
- A conventional renovation accumulates individual decisions (new kitchen, better bathroom, bigger living room) that may not add up to a spatially coherent result. An authored remodel makes one major spatial move — recovering the patio, creating a double-height space, opening the section — and every other decision follows from that.
- A conventional renovation is done when the budget is spent. An authored remodel is done when the design argument has been realized.
The Diagnosis: What the Existing House Is
The first phase of a MÉTODO remodel is the diagnosis — a careful reading of what the existing building has to offer and what it cannot do without structural transformation.
In Mexico City's residential stock, the most valuable existing conditions are:
- Concrete structural frames: bones that can outlast any finish intervention and carry whatever spatial reorganization is needed
- Internal patios: often underused or converted to service functions, but potentially recoverable as the spatial heart of the remodeled plan
- Ceiling heights: mid-century construction in Polanco, Roma, and Condesa typically has higher-than-standard ceiling heights — a resource that modern construction rarely provides at residential cost
- Urban relationships: the existing house's relationship to the street, to the neighbors, and to the sky is fixed — the remodel works with these rather than against them
The diagnosis also identifies what limits the possible: structural elements that cannot be removed, setbacks that constrain additions, and existing conditions (waterproofing failures, structural damage, non-compliant construction) that must be addressed before design intent can be pursued.
The Options Matrix: Choosing a Direction
After the diagnosis, we present the client with what we call the matriz de opciones — the options matrix. For a remodel, this typically means two or three distinct spatial arguments: one that works within the existing floor plate, one that introduces a new addition, and one that makes a single transformative move (opening the section to a double height, recovering the patio as the primary room).
The matrix is a decision tool. It lets the client compare approaches rather than approve a single direction they may not have understood. The process before the style — the decision before the drawing.
Material Honesty in the Remodel
An authored remodel in Mexico City takes the existing material logic seriously. If the house is a concrete frame, exposing the concrete in strategic locations is both honest and economical. If the floor is terrazzo, preserving and restoring it is both historically correct and materially superior to replacement.
The material additions — stone walls, wood ceilings, new openings with stone lintels — are introduced in relationship to what exists. The new and the old should be legible as a dialogue, not disguised to look seamless.
Próximos pasos
If you are planning a remodel of a Mexico City home and want a designed result rather than a renovation checklist, the conversation begins with the diagnosis. We look at what the house is before we propose what it could become.
To understand how we structure that conversation, conoce el método de MÉTODO.