This house in Manacor designed by OAM, with great beauty, restores to architecture its original vocation: to be a stage for life

On the gentle undulations of Mallorcan terrain sits Ca’n Gallineta, a house designed by OAM Oficina d’Arquitectura a Mallorca as a serene gesture towards the landscape. The elongated plot with a slight slope presented both a challenge and an opportunity: to take advantage of the highest point to unfold a south-facing façade, reducing earthworks to a minimum and favoring integration with the surroundings.

The architects at OAM conceived a single-storey house, discreet and elongated, camouflaged beneath the shelter of an existing pine grove and a new plantation of carob trees. From the road, the house dissolves into the vegetation; from the hillside, it remains hidden behind the forest. Here, architecture bends to the logic of the land.

Ca’n Gallineta is composed of several rectangular volumes that subtly shift in relation to each other, generating patios and porches that break the linearity of the façade. These bodies are unified under a large single-pitched roof, while a horizontal base of porches and pergolas, with rhythmically arranged pillars, softens the height of the whole. In this gesture, the ancient water conduits of the Mallorcan countryside resound: rural memory reinterpreted in a contemporary key.

A bright and flexible interior

The functional scheme is simple and precise: a strip of service spaces is attached to the north façade, covered with reed vaults, from where one accesses the rooms oriented to the south. These corridors are places of transit that expand into foyers, study, or kitchen, acquiring a life of their own. At the ends of the house, two independent night areas provide privacy for parents and children.

Sustainability beyond materials

The structural system relies on 30 cm-thick load-bearing walls of cellular concrete, light, insulating, and with a reduced ecological footprint. Its waste can be crushed and reused, within a clean and efficient construction cycle. Sustainability, however, goes beyond the material: the house incorporates passive strategies such as south orientation, limitation of openings to the north and west, and natural shading by pergolas and deciduous vegetation. These are complemented by state-of-the-art active systems, such as ventilation with heat recovery.

Local matter, Mediterranean soul

Every construction decision reaffirms a commitment to proximity and the environment: lime mortars for the façade, roof insulation with Neptune balls—posidonia oceanica collected on nearby shores—or floors treated with recycled ceramic. Humble elements that, in the hands of the architects, are transformed into poetic matter.

Ca’n Gallineta, a 301 m² house on rural land, thus becomes a manifesto of how to build today in Mallorca: light architecture upon the earth, attentive to the climate, faithful to tradition, open to the future. A project that turns simplicity into sophistication and restores to architecture its original vocation: to be a stage for life, to resonate with the place, and to merge with time.

Project: Ca’n Gallineta.
Location: Manacor (Mallorca).
Completion: 2025.
Built area: 301 m².
Architecture: OAM Oficina d’Arquitectura a Mallorca.
Architects: Toni y Biel Oliver Galmés.
Technical architect: Joan Brunet Alós.
Construction: J/H Construcciones Zaouaghi – Construccions Tomeu Ferrer.
Photography: José Hevia.
Source: OAM Oficina d’Arquitectura a Mallorca.

OAM Oficina d’Arquitectura a Mallorca

OAM is a studio founded by two brothers, Biel Oliver and Toni Oliver, who dream of building from the roots, with honesty and sensitivity. Since its foundation in 2017 in Manacor, OAM has proposed an architecture that converses with the ancient wisdom of Mediterranean tradition, while embracing its contemporary evolution. In their vision, tradition is not a vestige to be imitated, but a compass: one that reveals the essential. Thus, each project is conceived as a reinterpretation of the vernacular — local materials, passive strategies, natural textures — yet always guided by a poetic and functional intention.

OAM practices an architecture that seeks to merge with its surroundings: human scales, sincere proportions, spaces that breathe in the sun and are refreshed by the wind. They believe that a great idea should be expressible with a simple sketch; rigorous design emerges from a clear concept that organizes all the elements — topography, solar orientation, vegetation, materials — into a coherent symphony. The architecture that Biel and Toni envision is neither rigid nor closed: it is a stage for life, capable of transforming over time, embracing the passage of the seasons, and resonating with those who inhabit it.

Toni Oliver (1991), architect from ETSAB – Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC), brings a global perspective without losing his local roots. Before founding OAM, he collaborated with internationally and nationally renowned studios, gaining diverse experience: Foster + Partners in London, BAAS Arquitectura, Josep Ferrando in Barcelona; he also collaborated with TEd’A and Esteva i Esteva in Mallorca. This diversity taught him that the dialogue between context and project is the true raw material of meaningful architecture.

Biel Oliver (1992), architect from the University of Girona and with Interior Design studies at Tecnológico de Monterrey, has collaborated with architectural studios in the Balearic Islands, focusing his career on sustainable architecture and energy efficiency.

Although OAM is a young practice, it has already been recognized in various forums. They were finalists in several editions of Art Jove – Arquitectura in the Balearic Islands in 2021 and 2023; they also competed for the product design award in 2019 (Art Jove). Earlier, the studio (or its founders) received the Beques Arquia – Joves Arquitectes in 2016, and their proposals were recognized in product design, ceramic design and innovation competitions in Valencia (Cevisama) in 2014.

OAM seeks to remain faithful to an honest architectural language: to shun artifice, to cultivate simplicity, and to conceive each project as an unfolding story over time. Their work revolves around a few essential axes: Tradition with openness: tradition is not repeated, it is reinterpreted; not an aesthetic, but a reference that poetically nurtures decisions. Materiality and tactility: natural materials, honest finishes, and subtle variations sensitive to touch and light carry as much conceptual weight as functional. Genuine sustainability, as an integral commitment: from the use of local resources to passive strategies of ventilation, orientation and insulation, to evoking healthy and lasting environments. Integration with the landscape: every volume, every porch, every luminous plane seeks to dissolve the boundaries between interior and exterior, acting in harmony with the context.

Project by Biel Oliver y Toni Oliver. OAM Mallorca