Dog/Human House in Nakhon Pathom, Thailand by Ekar Architects

Dog/Human House is in the heart of Nakhon Pathom, an ancient city about forty minutes’ drive west of Bangkok. The project owner, Norawee Wainipitpong, is a Nakhon Pathom local who used to live in his family home, less than a kilometre away from Dog/Human House. Wainipitpong and his siblings live in Bangkok, having made their careers as physicians, but now he is spending more time with his parents in his hometown. That, however, has become a challenge, given his love for dogs large and small, and the limited space of the old family home. 

Originally, Wainipitpong planned to create a space near his family home for dog runs, with a small shelter – a shipping container perhaps – as a doghouse. After finding the right plot as well as an architect, Ekaphap Duangkaew of Ekar Architects – a small but notable design studio – the programme developed further: a new house would provide a living space for Wainipitpong and his dogs, but would be able to accommodate other people’s dogs as well. For a fee of around 850 Thai baht (£20) per hour, dogs can stay overnight, for days or even weeks, in a proper kennel space, with daily visits to the dog-run lawn and the saltwater swimming pool. Alternatively, dogs can simply come to use the lawn and the pool, and after a bath and a blow-dry they return home happy. Wainipitpong gave the architect a very specific brief: ‘To make this a living space for me and my dogs without causing any nuisance for the neighbours on this residential street, and to bring to the new house memories from the old one.’

The one-storey structure sits quietly on a trapezoidal plot of land, facing a two-lane street on its south side. Its low-lying silhouette blends in well with the neighbouring houses, which range from single to three storeys. The final design has three areas: the lawn and the pool, the building at the front of the plot, and the building to the rear. The front building is a long, gabled structure blocking the inside spaces from the public street, and is divided into three parts: a waiting area for clients and their dogs, a covered garden, and the owner’s residence. With translucent walls, the waiting area and covered garden are seamlessly joined; a plain wall along the street gives Wainipitpong’s residence its privacy, despite its proximity to the main entrance. The back building, which comprises the dog salon and dog hotel, is placed on the east edge of the property. The two buildings almost form a cloister – a frame for the lawn and the pool, where the dogs run and play. The canine swimming pool is raised approximately two and a half metres above the natural terrain, including the canal and the public pathway that runs along the northern edge of the compound, and to which the site appears to turn its back. Two levels of lawns slope down from the pool towards the front building; the architect’s intention is to make the lawns the stage and the dogs the main actors, safely and adoringly watched by their owners as well as Wainipitpong’s staff. 

While the project provides a living space for both humans and dogs, priority is given to the latter. Duangkaew says that he based his design on the dogs’ requirements: ‘The owner loves his dogs so much that if the dogs are happy, the owner is happy too. I wanted to design this place to cater to the dogs’ needs, whether they be physical or mental.’ This core idea permeates the entire design. Wainipitpong’s residence – where he stays a few days a week – is placed in the corner, very close to the public street, in order to give the better part of the site to the lawn. When asked what they like most about the place, dog owners’ first response is often the lawn. The buildings are so simply designed that they seem to retreat, playing a supporting role to the dogs. This stands in contrast to the increasing number of pets that are kept indoors, in condominiums and apartment buildings, a product of the densification of the Bangkok metropolitan area and rising pet ownership.

A major consideration was the metal fences that partition the spaces. These have been designed so that a feeling of freedom is maintained, while the dogs are kept safely within the confines of the complex. Thanks to this series of fenced areas, up to five groups of dogs can be accommodated separately – in the waiting area, the lawn, the pool, the salon and the indoor garden. Much of the fence is hidden by greenery, so that control and freedom appear in balance.

The key idea informing the project was that of designing with the dogs’ experience in mind. Columns in the central space – between the waiting area and the indoor garden – are round and cast in situ, with their precast concrete bases resembling tree trunks, encouraging passing dogs to raise their legs and mark the territory, according to the architect. The low roof edges provide spaces of different heights that can accommodate dogs of different sizes as well as humans – the roof is cut at a higher height for humans and lower for dogs. In practice, however, the dogs do not care; they simply lead their owners, pulling them impatiently towards the lawn. In fact, in some places the eaves prevent dog owners from seeing their beloved pets running around. The architect claims that the different roof edges accommodate different levels of privacy for spaces within the building, but the staggered edges can feel contrived. The sloping roof along the street does not seem particularly inviting, requiring a cut for the main entrance, and rubberised corners have been placed at strategic points to prevent minor head injuries from the sharp staggered edges – for humans only, of course; dogs run below happily, oblivious to such design flaws.

‘The low roof edges provide spaces of different heights that can accommodate dogs of different sizes as well as humans. In practice, however, the dogs do not care’

Flooring materials, such as large stone floor tiles designed to look like raw concrete, are durable and easily cleaned throughout the entire compound, though the columns may be an exception – the joints at the base of them appear to be less easy to clean. The buildings are well constructed, with a controlled palette of expensive materials that look economical. The corrugated roof tiles are Onduline, a material that is lightweight, absorbs heat very well, and resembles the corrugated tiles of nearby houses, but is relatively expensive compared with similar, locally made materials.

The project functions very well as a social space, attracting dog owners from around the city as well as further afield. Spaces are generously proportioned, and on the weekend that I visited the compound was in constant use. While waiting for their dogs’ treatments, owners ordered food and beverages, chatted to each other, worked on their laptops and played with their dogs. The atmosphere was very convivial; the building provides a variety of spaces and pleasant greenery for socialising and bonding between humans, as well as between humans and pets. Dog/Human House is a fascinating prototype for a mixed-use, pet-friendly building. Thailand currently has a population of 2.1 million pet dogs, an ageing society, and densifying urban centres, so one hopes and expects to see more projects like this in the future. As a building type, it extends the idea of residence to accommodate dogs and humans, as well as notions of ‘family’ to include not only humans outside the nuclear unit, but also non-human friends.