Hamilo Coast's natural beauty shines through the all-glass envelope of a repurposed hilltop chapel with a geometric abstraction of Mount Pico de Loro's silhouette for its roof
The St. Therese of the Child Jesus Chapel, popularly known as the Hamilo Coast Chapel, looks like a floating, almost weightless, geometric mass from afar. Its prominent feature, a massive roof sculpted after the silhouette of Mount Pico De Loro atop which the chapel sits, is the only volume noticeable from the foothills.
Glass panels surround the chapel’s open-plan hall with no walls. The design blurs the line between the indoors and the outdoors and makes the congregation area look like part of the tropical expanse. There is hardly a need for religious art inside. The beauty of the natural creation surrounding the chapel is enough to set the mood for a heightened experience of the divine presence.
After prayer, visitors can take a leisurely stroll around the veranda and enjoy the view of Nasugbu’s long coastline. The veranda connects to a wooden pathway that meanders around existing trees leading to the coastal community downhill. Slender white posts supporting the chapel’s iconic roof produce beautiful patterns of shadow on the floor when struck by sunlight.
Right: Preserving the natural lay of the land, the chapel stands on stilts. A wooden pathway connects the hilltop building to the residential resort community on the foothills.
"The design blurs the line between the indoors and the outdoors and makes the congregation area look like part of the tropical expanse."
At night, the chapel shines like a lantern with warm lighting emanating from its black expanded metal mesh ceiling. Before it became a quiet place of reflection, the Hamilo Coast Chapel was once a busy showroom of the 40-hectare Pico De Loro Cove, SM Group’s first residential resort development within Hamilo Coast. The adaptive reuse of the old showroom is the product of Visionarch’s collaboration with architect Carlos Arnaiz.
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"There is hardly a need for religious art inside. The beauty of the natural creation surrounding the chapel is enough to set the mood for a heightened experience of the divine presence."