Muffadal Saylawala

Nuestra Casa

A dilapidated house near the beach turned into a six-bedroom guesthouse in 2016, with a 10-meter water-tower lookout and murals by ten artists.

At a glance

Role
Designer and builder
When
2016 to now
Where
San Juan del Sur, two blocks from the beach
Team
Local crew; ten artists for the Art-A-Thon
Scope
Remodel and expansion of a house into a six-bedroom guesthouse
A shower lit through a window of colored glass bottles
The bottle-wall shower.

Results

  • 6Bedrooms, each with its own bathroom, from a dilapidated house
  • 10 mWater tower that doubles as storage and a lookout
  • 10Artists who painted the murals in one week
  • Summer 2016Opened to guests

Casa Oro kept filling up, and not everyone who wanted to stay with us wanted a hostel. So in 2016 I found a dilapidated house a couple of blocks from the beach and made it a guesthouse.

A tower with three jobs

I designed it, contracted it and checked every detail myself. I remodeled the whole house, added a new room and a bathroom, built the terrace and a laundry and service area, and put up a 10-meter water tower that does three jobs: it holds the house’s water up high, it keeps storage underneath, and on top it’s a lookout over the bay.

When it was done Nuestra Casa had six bedrooms, each with its own bathroom, a shared kitchen, air conditioning and a small pool. In one bathroom, the Trotamundos, the shower light comes through a window of colored glass bottles.

The top room, the King Suite Sea View, has its own living room and a private balcony over the bay. Hot water comes from the sun. Town and the beach are two blocks away, which made it the house for guests who want to walk everywhere and still sleep somewhere quiet.

A covered pool under a timber roof with two hammocks
The covered pool.

The Art-A-Thon

To finish it, I launched an Art-A-Thon: a weeklong painting party where ten artists, from Nicaragua and around the world, covered every room and common space in murals. Every room also has hand-woven cloth. Nuestra Casa opened in the summer of 2016, and the artists’ work is still on the walls.

Artists kept coming: fifteen painted the murals in the Casa Oro remodel that winter, and Casa Oro now hosts an artist residency.

A room with two beds, a timber wardrobe and a black and white mural
A family room at Nuestra Casa.

The Terrace of Angels

From the top of the tower you watch the sun go down over the whole bay. We call it the Terrace of Angels.

Today Nuestra Casa sleeps up to 14 people in six rooms, rented by the room or as a whole house for families and groups.

A lounge with low sofas and a mural of a sloth in the jungle
The lounge and its sloth.

What I did

  • Saw the demand first: Casa Oro kept filling up with guests who wanted to stay with us but not in a hostel
  • Found a dilapidated house two blocks from the beach and remodeled all of it: a new room, a new bathroom, the terrace, and a laundry and service area
  • Designed a 10-meter water tower that does three jobs: water up high, storage underneath and a lookout deck over the bay on top
  • Contracted the work and checked every detail myself
  • Finished it with a weeklong Art-A-Thon: ten artists from Nicaragua and around the world painted murals in every room and common space
  • Opened it in the summer of 2016; it now sleeps up to 14 in six rooms, rented by the room or as a whole house

Deliverables

  • A six-bedroom guesthouse, each room with its own bathroom, plus a shared kitchen and air conditioning
  • A new room, and the whole house remodeled
  • The terrace
  • A 10-meter water tower with the lookout deck, the Terrace of Angels, on top
  • Murals in every room and common space, and hand-woven cloth in every room
  • The Trotamundos bathroom, lit through a window of colored glass bottles

Skills

  • Remodel design for small hospitality
  • Designing one structure to do several jobs
  • Construction contracting and quality control
  • Art direction and running an artist program
  • Designing a rental to sell by the room or the whole house
The bay of San Juan del Sur and its headland under a clear sky, seen over trees and rooftops from Nuestra Casa
Nuestra Casa, the view over the bay, 2026.
A red-painted stair with a white handrail climbing beside a stone wall and a sketched mural, wood paneling above
Nuestra Casa, the stair, 2026.
A room paneled in dark wood with exposed beams, a double bed with folded towels, a wood wardrobe and a mosaic tile floor
Nuestra Casa, a wood-paneled room, 2026.

What I learned

Let one structure do several jobs. The tower stores the water, holds the tools and sells the sunset.

  • The Casa Oro restaurant in the evening: guests at wooden tables and standing between painted columns, a couple dancing at the back

    Casa Oro

    Partner and operator

    San Juan del Sur’s first hostel, bought with partners in 2015, rebuilt in four months, and reopened in January 2017 with the first Café Oro.

    San Juan del Sur, 2015 to now

  • A drone view over Casa Andalucía's pool and tile roofs, the bay of San Juan del Sur and its headland beyond

    Casa Andalucía

    Designer, builder, engineer

    A hillside B&B over the bay, rebuilt twice: once by choice, with bamboo and bottle walls, and once after an October 2017 storm brought the hill down.

    San Juan del Sur, 2016 to now

  • A white and yellow house behind yellow gates, a bicycle on the patio

    Casa Ruth

    Designer and builder

    An abandoned five-bedroom house on a hill over the bay, gutted and rebuilt with a crew of ten: new wiring, polished brick and a straw-insulated roof.

    San Juan del Sur, 2017 to now

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