Who are we?
Reserva Santa Fe, located in the municipality of Lerma, State of Mexico, is a housing development that will house 500 families on a 204-hectare site. Within these hectares, 107 hectares are dedicated to a permanently protected coniferous forest. It is important to note that the plots on which the houses and general infrastructure of the development are built were previously degraded due to agricultural and livestock activities that took place mainly in the 1980s.
Our community has set a goal of returning more natural resources to the environment than we use to build, live and operate the development. To achieve this, we will implement a variety of sustainable practices. For example, we will capture rainwater and treat it on site for potable use, thus avoiding the extraction of water from wells.
Characteristics of the project
Low density
We will build 2.4 houses per hectare, distributed in 217 single-family lots, 37 single-family homes and 246 multi-family homes, located in former agricultural plots that are impacted, so our Master Plan densifies the occupation of housing and construction uses in 86 hectares.
Ecosystem regeneration
Our goal is to recover ecosystems that were degraded prior to development, for which we will conserve and restore twice the amount of space we occupied for construction, that is 172 hectares of priority ecosystems.
Humanscale
The design of the development takes the human being as the main parameter, so we will have only 5 km of interior streets and 25 km of pedestrian paths and walkways for human-powered instruments.
Biophilia
We create environments that promote emotional and physical connection with nature, improving the health and well-being of the community, including the use of natural light, organic materials, indoor vegetation and outdoor views. By embracing biophilia, we seek to re-establish our relationship with nature in urban environments, creating healthier and more pleasant spaces to live, work and enjoy.
Place
The objective of Pétalo de Sitio is to redefine the way in which people understand and relate to the natural environment that sustains us, understanding in detail the conditions of the space, its identity, culture, history, natural patterns and abiotic conditions, designing a community that participates in the regeneration of the ecosystem and that takes the human being as the main actor.
Water
Its objective is to readjust the way people use water and redefine the concept of ‘waste’ in the built environment, so that water is valued as a scarce and highly precious resource, so our goal is to capture, purify and treat enough water for homes and community buildings, returning at least an additional 5% of the resource to the ecosystem.
Energy
We seek to contribute to creating a new era of design, in which the built environment is based solely on renewable forms of energy and operates year-round in a safe and pollution-free manner. It also aims to prioritize reductions and optimization before applying technological solutions to eliminate unnecessary waste of energy, resources and money.
Health and Happiness
It is intended to focus on the core conditions that must be present to create strong, healthy communities filled with happy, productive people, rather than addressing all the possible ways in which our neighborhoods and cities can compromise the human experience.
Materials
The goal of the Materials Petal is to help create a materials economy for building construction, operation and maintenance that is non-toxic, ecologically restorative, socially equitable, low in emissions and transparent about manufacturing content.
Equity
It seeks to relate the impacts of design and development to their ability to foster a true sense of community. A society that embraces all sectors of humanity and allows the dignity of equal access is a civilization in the best position to make decisions that protect and restore the natural environment.
Beauty
It is recognizing the need for beauty as a precursor to caring about protecting and conserving nature, improving our relationships with our neighbors and serving the common good. As a society, we are often surrounded by ugly and inhumane physical environments. If we don’t care about our homes, streets, offices, and neighborhoods, Why should we extend that concern to our rural areas, forests, or ecosystems?
