This or That? A comparison between Pitched and Butterfly Roofs

A while back, a friend doubled up as a client and had me design a house for his parents. The process started as most do; they share Pinterest boards; we discussed a brief and we got moving. Around the same time, I was doing revisions on a portfolio for one of the big firms in Nairobi. Naturally, I came across a few interesting build projects and shared some on my WhatsApp status. My client viewed it, and got hooked like a fish. What had started as a standard pitched roof design became a dream for a butterfly roof; and our somewhat completed floor plans didn’t change in the slightest. The sizes of rooms, the circulation and orientation of the house on site remained the same.

We are now deep in the construction of the more striking butterfly roof option, and every time I go to site for a progress inspection, I am constantly reminded of what could have been. Which perhaps begs the question, which is better, the butterfly or the pitch?

Architecture has always had a complicated relationship with novelty. We are all drawn to things that catch the eye, those that challenge convention, and those that look completely unfamiliar to us, which is what our butterfly option was. As a matter of fact, when I went to set out the plans on site, one of my client’s neighbors, an old man, pulled me aside and asked me if I had seen similar designs in Nakuru because he was convinced there weren’t many in Nairobi. I wasn’t sure if he was wowed by our proposal or was worried it was too foreign for the village.