House structure: what reinforced concrete, masonry and open spans change in your project

Updated on 07/06/2026 by EZA Engenharia

The structure of the house is the decision that defines how far your project can go. It's what determines whether the living room will have a generous clear span or a column in the middle of the way, whether the window frame can take up the entire wall, whether the upper floor can cantilever over the garage. In more than 35 years building in Criciúma and the region, we've seen many beautiful designs run up against a structure that couldn't keep up. In this piece I explain how structural masonry, reinforced concrete, and prestressing enable, or limit, what the architecture imagines.

The house's structure decides what the design can be

Every project is born from wishes: a spacious living room integrated with the kitchen, corner window frames opening onto the garden, a double-height ceiling at the entrance. What turns these wishes into a project is the structure. It is the skeleton that holds everything up, and each structural choice opens or closes doors for the rest of the project.

The detail that many people discover too late: this decision happens right at the start, together with the design, and afterward it becomes extremely expensive to change. A poorly positioned column stays with the family for the rest of the house's life. That's why the structure needs to be thought out together with the architecture, never after it.

Structural masonry: more economical, less freedom

In structural masonry, the walls themselves carry the weight of the house. There are no separate columns and beams: the blocks play both roles at once, enclosing and supporting. This simplifies construction and tends to lower costs on more compact projects with simple, repetitive floor plans.

The price of that saving is freedom. Since nearly every wall is structural, you can't open a large span wherever you want, nor knock down a wall later without a serious engineering study. Door and window openings are also more limited. For a high-end house, which thrives on integration and generous spans, this system tends to lock the design concept right at the start.

Reinforced concrete: open floor plan, large spans and generous openings

In reinforced concrete, what supports the house is the set of columns, beams and slabs. The walls become mere enclosure: they close off and divide the spaces, but carry no load. In practice, this hands the floor plan back to the architect.

It is this logic that makes possible what the high-end market asks for most today. Integrated spaces with no column in the middle of the room. Floor-to-ceiling window frames. An upper floor projecting as a cantilever. Every large opening takes a wall out of the way, and the structure compensates with well-calculated beams and columns. The more natural lighting and integration the design wants, the more the structure has to work.

• Wide open spans in living rooms and integrated gourmet areas
• Cantilevers, with floors that project out without visible support
• Double-height ceilings and mezzanines
• Large frames, floor-to-ceiling and corner

Prestressing: when the required span is genuinely large

There's a point where conventional reinforced concrete starts to charge a high price: to span a very large opening, the beam needs to be very tall, or columns appear where no one wanted them. That's where prestressing comes in, a technique we use in EZA's projects. They are steel cables tensioned inside the concrete, which give the piece more strength and durability.

With a prestressed slab or beam, the same span is bridged with slimmer members and fewer supports. The result shows up in the space: the living room stays clean, the ceiling height is not eaten up by a tall beam and the façade gains freedom. Not every house needs it. But when the project calls for an out-of-the-ordinary span, it is prestressing that closes the equation.

In practice: structure and architecture need to be born together

Here at EZA, the structure is not a design that arrives finished from outside and leaves the project to fend for itself. We work with design coordination and VR visualization with the client: structure, architecture and installations are checked together before the site, and the client understands every detail and anticipates decisions with more confidence.

During execution, concrete pouring has an engineer overseeing it. This is the moment when the calculated structure becomes a real structure, and a slab can't be redone without a headache. An example of where this leads: at the Casa Bloco, a project we built with a design by ES Arquitetura, the roof blocks seem to float above the house. That effect is no photo trick. It is structure conceived from the very first stroke to support what the architecture envisioned.

In the end, the structure is what separates the project that stayed on paper from the project that became a house. Structural masonry handles simple programs well, reinforced concrete gives the freedom that high-end demands, and prestressing comes in when the span exceeds the ordinary. The safe path is to define this early, with engineering and architecture talking to each other from the architectural design. If you are planning to build in Criciúma and the surrounding region and want to know what the structure can do for your project, reach out to EZA on WhatsApp (48) 99191-2018, send an email to [email protected] or visit eza.com.br. For over 35 years we have been turning open spans, cantilevers and high ceilings into real homes.