Days at This Mallorca Home Revolve Around the Sprawling Patio

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When Vincenç Mulet and Uli Trautmann were looking for a place to build a vacation home on Mallorca, they had a goal in mind: to be near a surfing beach “so we could just carry our boards out to the sea,” Mulet says.

So in 2020, the pair—Mulet is an architect and Trautmann, a creative and design consultant—bought a plot on the northern part of the island where Mulet used to vacation as a kid. Ten months later, they had built a three bedroom, two bathroom patio house that is only around 1,000 square feet, but thanks to the sprawling outdoor space, it feels double the size, especially because they get to use the breezy open-air lounge year-round.

“The idea was to create frames for the [surrounding] gardens and the ocean,” Mulet says. The home is modular, in a way, where the doors can be opened and closed at different points, changing the whole look and feel of the space. “You can have different views depending on the season,” he adds.

In the winter, the patio acts as an infrequent outdoor space because the sun only warms certain areas. But in the summer, the mint shutters stay open, and it becomes like a second living room where the pair entertains friends with long lunches, day drinking, and dinners that begin between 9:30 and 11 p.m., as is the Spanish way. That is, after all the surfing.

sunny patio — Trautmann: On Mallorca, green shutters are the most basic ones, but a dark green, which all the old houses have. So we came up with this color, which is more mint.
Mulet: The other reason we chose it is because the sea in Mallorca is amazing—and it reminds us of the color of the water.
Trautmann: We like to bring nature in!

man reading in dining chair — Mulet: Something that was very important to me and Uli was privacy. All of the shutters slide open and closed, so you can create a private space when you want.
Trautmann: When they’re open, there are beautiful views of the gardens and sky. | *Folding Chairs,* *Amazon*.

covered patio with chaises — Trautmann: Our home is in the hottest village on the island in the summer, so we had to think about orientation in terms of the wind and sun and the shadows.
Mulet: The pergola is made from cane, which is traditional here, but also it produces a shadow while also letting heat escape. If you had a concrete floor or roof, the heat can’t go out. | Side Table, *Amazon*.

small pool — Mulet: This is a dipping pool, not a swimming pool. It’s an element of an Arabic tradition, because the water in the Arabic Gardens is life.
Trautmann: And there’s a little spring that’s running all the time.

modern dining tables with sliding door oen — Trautmann: [Even though we work in hotels], this home is really very individual to us. It’s just that we took some of our experience and design tricks from hotels and integrated them into our normal life. Like hidden spaces, for example. We have a lot of hidden cupboards, hidden wardrobes, open spaces like sliding doors in an open space. We adapted those things from the hotel world and made it our own. | *Dining* *Chair*s, *Design Within Reach*.

gray sectional — Trautmann: Not only can we open the shutters, but all the windows can slide completely into the walls. In summer, we don’t close them at night or when we go away. They’re just always open. We have air conditioning but we try not to use it because you always have a breeze from the sea.
Milet: We only use it about five or six days a year. | *Table,* *Design Within Reach*.

small green kitchen — Mulet: I like working with a limited range of colors and materials—but arriving at [what those are] is a big process because I start with so many ideas, then reduce them to the minimum amount. But it’s not a minimalist house. It has soul.

Julie Vadnal

Greg Cox/Bureaux

Sven Alberding/Bureaux

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