Située non loin de Madrid, la Balcony House est un projet de 952m2 sur 3 étages de l’espagnol Joaquim Torres du duo d’architectes A-cero. Jouant sur des lignes horizontales et de grands espaces ouverts sur un environnement naturel superbe, le résultat est magnifique. A découvrir en images dans la suite de l’article.
Spanish studio Langarita-Navarro Arquitectos has created an arts centre in Madrid by installing a flexible structure behind the concrete walls of an old industrial building (+ slideshow).
The renovated building functions as a research laboratory and exhibition space for Medialab-Prado, a city-funded organisation exploring the production and dissemination of art and digital culture.
La Serrería Belga, or The Belgian Sawmill, was built in the early twentieth century. For the renovation, architects María Langarita and Víctor Navarro decided to leave the facade of the old building intact and insert a more flexible structure inside, which they nicknamed La Cosa, or The Thing.
“[It is] a light and articulated structure with a certain pre-technological air that, infiltrated in the building, enables a large potential for transformation,” they explain.
The architects used lightweight and durable materials that can easily be taken apart and repurposed to facilitiate the changing needs of the organisation.
“Any duplication or incorporation of elements or solutions that had already been contributed by the Serrería building was avoided,” they say.
A three-storey volume was inserted into a void at the centre of the building and features translucent walls that can be illuminated with different neon colours.
A series of wooden boxes provides an entrance and smaller rooms elsewhere in the building. There are also new staircases, wooden furniture and blinds that function as projection screens.
Langarita-Navarro Arquitectos worked on a similar project to construct a nomadic music academy in a Madrid warehouse. Other buildings by the studio include a road-side restaurant and event space and a house with an irregular geometric platform.
See more architecture and interiors in Madrid, including a cinema in a former slaughterhouse.
Here’s some more information from Langarita-Navarro Arquitectos:
Medialab-Prado
Madrid, Spain
Perhaps more than anything else, it is the very strangeness of the diverging intentions found in the La Serrería Belga adaptation project for the Medialab-Prado that makes it possible for them to coexist, though not without a certain measure of irony.
The first of these caustic coexistences stems from a certain institutional schizophrenia. While the ‘Paseo del Arte’ was transformed into Madrid City Hall’s banner to attract international tourism, an architectural competition was simultaneously promoted in the same area, which would end up serving an institution that sponsored debates that were deeply critical of this model.
Medialab defines itself as “a space for the production, research and dissemination of digital culture and the confluence between art, science, technology and society”, and, in contrast to the traditional exhibition model, it promotes production as a permeable process, supplanting the figure of the spectator with that of the actor, or the figure of the mediator as a facilitator of connections.
La Serrería vs La Cosa is another pattern of coexistence that, like a conflicting dialect, facilitated the occupation of the intermediate space existing between both rivals, beyond the conventional concept of restoration.
La Serrería Belga (The Belgian Sawmill) was built in various stages starting in the 1920’s by the architect Manuel Álvarez Naya and it was one of the first architectural achievements in Madrid to employ reinforced concrete. For its part, La Cosa (The Thing), is the name that we have used to refer to the group of mechanisms, installations and facilities that, when assembled, made it possible to bring the building up to date with current requirements.
A light and articulated structure with a certain pre-technological air that, infiltrated in the building, enables a large potential for transformation. Ultimately, it is the coexistence of opposites that made it possible to think of the halfway point between these interlocutors not as a consummate product, but rather as an open, versatile process activated by its users.
These forms of coexistence created the scope for some of the strategies used in this adaptation:
» The appropriation of the existing building, not only as a historic narration, but also as a container for latent energies that have joined the project as effective material. Any duplication or incorporation of elements or solutions that had already been contributed by the Serrería building was avoided.
» The non-specific treatment of the spaces. This condition resulted in a homogenous approach to material solutions and the uniform distribution of installations.
» Thinking about the action as a stratification with different levels of change over time. Lightweight construction systems that can be disassembled were chosen, as were materials whose durability and adaptability will not condition future transformations.
» Looking at each new intervention as an opportunity to incorporate support systems for creative actions and research. This included solutions such as the use of double blinds as projection screens, taking advantage of voids in the existing structure to create a retro-projected floor, the use of the dividing wall as a digital facade and the design of La Cosa as a mechanism for digital experimentation.
Project: Adaptation of the Serrería Belga for the Centro Medialab-Prado location
Location: Madrid
Architects: María Langarita and Víctor Navarro
Collaborators: Elena Castillo, Marta Colón, Javier González Galán, Roberto González, Juan Palencia, Guillermo Trapiello, Gonzalo Gutiérrez, Paula García-Masedo
Surveyor: Santiago Hernán Martín
Structures: Mecanismo
Installations: Úrculo Ingenieros
Landscaping: Lorena García Rodríguez
Project date: January 2008
Client: Área de las Artes. Madrid City Hall
Budget: 1600 euros/m2
The post Medialab-Prado by
Langarita-Navarro Arquitectos appeared first on Dezeen.
by Emily Millett Populated by a dynamically passionate and exuberant people who never seem to need an excuse to indulge in recreational hedonism, Madrid is varied and rewarding when it comes to pursuits of decadence. Eating delicious tapas, drinking fine wines and general flamboyant merrymaking are all encouraged and happily…
Continue Reading…
Questo è il Madrid Dream tavola da freeride simmetrica W-concaved. La grafica poi è davvero stupenda, la trovate qui.
Japanese architect Shigeru Ban has completed a temporary pavilion made from cardboard tubes at the IE School of Architecture and Design in Madrid.
The Paper Pavilion, which was inaugurated yesterday, is constructed in the university’s Serrano garden and will serve as a multi-purpose space for events, meetings, talks and exhibitions.
The project had a restricted budget, so Shigeru Ban designed a system of cardboard roof trusses and columns which were cheap to install and can be easily recycled when the building is eventually dismantled.
The tubes were manufactured and waterproofed locally in Spain and were assembled by members of the surrounding community.
The IE School commissioned the pavilion, supported by the Japan Foundation. The opening event was a lecture by Ban entitled “Appropriate Architecture”.
Tokyo architect Shigeru Ban has used cardboard to construct a number of pavilions and structures in recent years, which ties closely to his work on disaster relief projects. He is currently working on a cardboard cathedral in Christchurch, New Zealand, and has also built a pavilion with cardboard columns in Moscow and a temporary tower made of paper tubes.
See more architecture by Shigeru Ban on Dezeen or see more design with cardboard.
Photography is by Fernando Guerra.
The post IE Paper Pavilion
by Shigeru Ban appeared first on Dezeen.
An undulating canopy of cardboard tubes by American studio Cristina Parreño Architecture and students from MIT hovered over visitors at the ARCOMadrid art fair in Spain last month (+ slideshow).
Cristina Parreño Architecture worked with a team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to create the Paper Chandeliers installation in the VIP area of ARCOMadrid.
The white cardboard tubes were suspended from a wire mesh structure and the cables holding the tubes were cut to different lengths to create the varied topography.
Lights were fixed above the installation to shine down through the gaps in the tubes.
“The light was extremely simple – it was really the geometry of the surface that created the light effect,” Parreño told Dezeen.
The team from MIT comprised James Coleman, Sharon Xu, Koharu Usui, Natthida Wiwatwicha and Hannah Ahlblad.
We’ve featured lots of paper installations on Dezeen, including a canopy of 11,000 patterned paper sheets and a tunnel made from hollow paper stars – see all paper design.
Other installations we’ve published lately include a wall of clocks that make patterns with their moving hands and a warehouse filled with luminous tissue paper clouds – see all installations.
Photographs are by Luis Asin.
The post Paper Chandeliers by Cristina Parreño
Architecture and MIT appeared first on Dezeen.
Products are displayed amongst an array of colourful metal wireframes at this pharmacy in Madrid by interiors studio Stone Designs (+ slideshow).
“We use colour as an international language that everyone understands,” Stone Designs partner Cutu Mazuelos told Dezeen. “We love to use colour as a tool that lets people feel the atmosphere that we want to show them, turning the experience of buying medicine into a social event.”
Some of the wireframe boxes sit on a wooden platform, while others are mounted onto the walls.
Shelving colours shift from vivid red and pink on one wall to bright orange and yellow on another. Meanwhile, the checkout counter is finished in pale blue and features a white marble surface.
Pendant lights hang from the ceiling and patterned tiles cover the floor.
The shop is located beneath an old bridge, giving the space an arched ceiling.
Other pharmacies designed in recent years include one in Athens with a facade punctured by Braille and one in Belgium with a sliding cross-shaped window. See more pharmacies on Dezeen.
Here’s a project description from Stone Designs:
Farmacia de los Austrias The Farmacia de los Austrias (De los Austrias Chemist) is placed in one of the most emblematic areas of historical Madrid.
Our initial idea was to create a new space typology, in which tradition and vanguard merge in such a subtle way that originate a slow and deliberate dialogue in which no element stands out of the rest, creating an almost musical harmony.
Products are displayed in really thin metallic structures standing in the bluish walls, creating a sweet and warm chromatic range that makes us feel at ease. This space transmits that we are attended by real professionals, but with a more human touch than usual.
Some details such as the white marble counter help to strengthen the concept of the “well done job” that oozes the old; while other materials like the tiled floor, embrace us in a warm and close atmosphere.
It is a project in which, due to its nature and small size, even the slightest detail has been taken care of, creating an enormous sensory universe that makes the visitor enjoy a most gratifying experience.
The post De los Austrias Chemist
by Stone Designs appeared first on Dezeen.
Christmas shoppers in Madrid can stroll under glittering circles of LEDs designed by Italian architect Teresa Sapey (+ slideshow).
The Christmas lights were designed by Teresa Sapey for Calle Serrano, an upmarket shopping street in the Spanish capital.
Every year, Madrid’s city council asks a designer or architect to create festive street lighting.
Sapey used energy efficient LEDs to form unique combinations of pattern and colour in each circle.
She founded her architecture studio in Madrid in 1990.
We previously featured Christmas lights in the shape of stars and dominoes that were installed across Lisbon last year.
We’ve also reported on another outdoor lighting project in Madrid – an outbreak of illuminated silicone nipples stuck onto statues by guerrilla lighting designers Luzinterruptus.
See all our stories about Christmas »
See all our stories about lighting »
See all our stories about Madrid »
Here’s some more information from the designer:
Every single year, Madrid council asks some of the most important designers, architects or courtiers to make designs for Madrid’s streets. Teresa Sapey was asked to conceive Serrano Street’s Christmas lighting. Placed in one of the most luxurious neighbourhoods in Madrid, Serrano Street is well known for the high fashion designer’s shops.
It seemed to be a very difficult task, but Teresa thought this was a good chance to lighten up the street using very colourful and geometric designs. Her aim was to turn the grey and cold Serrano into a warm place, filled with colour.
Her designs have a countless amount of colours combined with circle shapes. Each one is different from the others, forming a sequence of drawings that can be seen from both sides.
This design concerns as well environmental conservation and ecology. Made by using LED technology, it is also sustainable and efficient, requiring less power and producing low energy consumption.
The post Christmas lights in Madrid
by Teresa Sapey appeared first on Dezeen.
Surfaces of marble and hardwood spread through the rooms of this renovated apartment in Madrid by Spanish architects Schneider Colao (+ slideshow).
The residence is located on the third floor of a 19th century apartment block and the architects have removed some of the original walls to create larger bedrooms and a central living room.
Unusually, a walk-through shower runs along the side of the living room, but can be screened behind a set of sliding doors.
“The owners practice yoga and meditation,” explains architect Jesus Colao. “They wanted to simply define wet and dry areas, rather than feel they were constantly entering a different space.”
The shower walkway stretches between bathrooms on opposite sides of the apartment, including one that opens out to the main entrance.
“Traditionally many Moorish homes, not limited to religious buildings, had a fountain for cleansing prior to entering a home or shop,” said Colao, to explain the idea behind this arrangement.
Marble floors and surfaces can be found in each of the wet areas, including a terrace at the rear of the apartment that features an outdoor sink.
Dinesen hardwood covers the floors of the two bedrooms, while softwood beams create ribbed ceilings over the bathrooms.
See more stories about apartment interiors, including one in Milan with a wireframe staircase.
Photography is by Diego Dominguez.
Here’s some text from the architects:
Orfila Flat by Schneider Colao Architects
Located on a quiet street in the Chamberi neighborhood of central Madrid, the Orfila flat is a gut renovation intervened within a historic 19th century apartment building. The original 200 sq. meter flat contained a winding maze of rooms which were gutted to design a structural framework allowing for an open plan which brings together various domestic programs including sleeping quarters, office, living space, open shower, kitchen and terrace.
3D axonometric plan – click above for larger image and key
The project materials are addressed simply using naturally treated Macael marble throughout the flat and Dinesen hardwood floors in the bedrooms. The massive nature of the marble surface offers a continuous artificial landscape that fuses washrooms and public spaces into one.
Vertical openings were enlarged through structural means as much as possible and a terrace was extended beyond the existing limits of the property to maximize natural light.
Plan – click above for larger image and key
Project Team:
Schneider Colao (Architects)
Jesus Colao (Lead Design Architect)
Beatriz Pérez Pérez de Iriarte (Design Architect)
Julia Lillo García (Design Architect)
The post Orfila Flat by
Schneider Colao appeared first on Dezeen.
Test tubes of olive oil line one wall of this high-tech workshop designed for Michelin-starred chef Paco Roncero by Spanish studio Carmen Baselga Taller de Proyectos.
Located in the nineteenth century Casino de Madrid building, which also houses his Terraza del Casino restaurant, the workshop provides a space for olive-oil expert Roncero to experiment with new ideas.
The room, which is higher than it is wide, had significant damage to its floors and mouldings. Carmen Baselga’s studio renovated the space in collaboration with designers S3-Tau and created a clean white interior with room to seat nine people.
Along one wall is the ‘oleotec’, which holds 216 types of olive oil in glass test tubes. The oils are identified by the numbers and the letters engraved alongside them, while a touch screen provides information about each one.
The ceramic table has heated areas to keep plates warm or cool as required, while vibrating areas help to prepare certain dishes. A cooking hob and tap are integrated into the table, and guests can even take notes directly onto the surface.
Diffusers are installed inside hanging tubes to vaporise water and maintain the correct humidity. Some diffusers also hold unusual custom-made scents, including mushroom and humid grass.
Appliances including a dishwasher and fridge are hidden inside ash-panelled units along the walls.
A translucent screen, printed with an image of Roncero’s hands, lets light enter the room without glare.
Photographs are by Gerald Kiernan.
See more stories about restaurants »
Here’s some more information from the designers:
Projecting Paco Roncero’s dream:
An innovative project of multisensory gastronomy
Project: Paco Roncero workshop in The Casino of Madrid
Designed by: Carmen Baselga Taller de Proyectos in collaboration with S3-Tau (departament of Innovación from Tau firm).
Paco Roncero: Chef with three “Repsol Sun”, two Michelín Stars and a Nacional award of Gastronomy 2006. Olive oil specialist.
The project takes place in a space where the most advanced technologies, the new materials and ecosustainable systems for the I+D+I will be put together with the risqué gastronomic proposals of a perfect technique from the chef.
The place
The space is Paco Roncero’s gastronomic research workshop of Paco Roncero, where the chef develops his new creations. It is a place to experiment in the double meaning of the word, that is, testing, trying; but also to experiment with the meaning of feeling and perceiving. And with this aim the surroundings and the different work spaces have been designed.
This place will allow an exploration of the relationships between gastronomy and the surrounding: human perception from the influence of, for example, certain colors, shapes and flavors; or from environmental comfort variables such as temperature, humidity, sound and light, manipulated in the search of well-being, or looking to generate different types of sensations that result in emotions, trying to build, with all this, a synesthetic experience where taste is the backbone.
The place is located on the same floor as the libraries in the old “Casino de Madrid”, in C/Alcalá number 15. It is not accessible to the general public, because it is a private work area. To the different sessions, lunches or experimental dinners that are going to be programmed with certain cadence, one can only go with direct invitation from the chef, due to the fact that they will be forming part of the research project.
The room has very peculiar proportions; it is very long and it is higher than it is wide, with a big entrance door at each end; one of them is linked to an office to support the running of the workshop, that has also been designed inside the project. There is a running theme of the materials and base colours throughout. The other door links to the noble areas of the Casino and this is where the guests will enter and leave.
At the beginning we found a space dating back to 1910, but very damaged with old, however not antique, floors that had replaced the original ones made of wood, some of which could be found with an old fitted carpet in some areas. Some of the decorative molding was broken and in general both ceilings and walls appeared to be covered with stippled-finish paint which ran over the surface of the room indiscriminately above the mouldings and decorative reliefs. Cables, gutters or switches of different models and periods were superimposed depending on the needs of the offices that had been there. The air conditioning installation, as it was on the surface was very invasive; it had a lot of presence and had ruined part of the ceiling and the walls.
The aim was to create a big white box that kept the character of its time, whereupon the first work was the rehabilitation. Inside this box, in a superimposed way allowing the difference between the past and present to be seen, the space was projected, designing the different elements that modernized it and defined it with a contemporary and changeable character thanks to technology (projections, different types of lighting, sound, scents, etc…).
The access
Like with every liturgical ritual, first of all you need to go through water. The first thing you find when you arrive, just behind the door, is a washbasin welcoming you. This washbasin is the model Kubo from Boing, made of flexible polyurethane, and the tap is the Ondus model from Grohe. Two clothes racks, made of stainless steel and designed by Carmen Baselga_Taller de proyectos, flank the sides of the main entrance.
El pavimento
The floor is particularly special as it incorporates the heating system for this room with the Waytec System with heated sheets and automatic temperature control. This is the Colortech 60×60 natural white model from Tau, which continues in line with the rest of the ceramic materials used in the project. This shows the different applications and uses of the product Keraon from Tau, chosen in this case in natural white colour.
The table
Conceived as a type of large worktop to test new dishes, there is also room to seat nine guests including the chef. The surface is made of keraon (Tau ceramic) and the structure of the table legs is made of ash. Under this naive appearance, multiple uses are hidden, thanks to the technology that lives inside it and thanks to the goodness of the ceramic surface that allows the most sophisticated effects to combine with something as basic as, for example, taking notes or sketching directly on the table.
The water and fire areas are integrated into the table to be able to cook, however there are also capacitative sensors to control the sound or the temperature of the table. It has nine individual heated areas whose function is keep the plate warm, another hotter area and a cooling area near the kitchen area, as well as zones of agitation and vibration between the guests that will help to prepare certain dishes during the meal. The tap is K7 Digital model from Grohe, that has a wireless control. It is an innovation that is shown in this space as a novelty.
The chairs
The chairs were designed based on special needs, taking into account that the height would not be the habitual for an eating chair, because they have to be used with the table/worktop that is 97cm high. On the one hand we were searching for comfort; they have to be comfortable for a meal and its after-lunch/after-dinner conversation. On the other hand, an essential requirement was that they had to be of adjustable height and swivel with wheels to allow full mobility. From all of this, a hybrid chair was invented, between what would be an office seat, a kitchen chair and an armchair. As a chair/armchair, the model Tauro from Andreu World offered us all the guarantees of comfort, and starting from here appropriate modifications were made to reach the planned aims.
The oleotec
This has a capacity for 216 types of olive oil that the chef will be selecting as an expert in olive oil. It was created using the mural system Dry System, in Keraon in natural white color, combining bright and matt surfaces, where the numbers and the letters are engraved to be able to identify each oil. The touch screen located in the center gives the information about every product in this oil panel. When the oleotec was designed, a convection cooling system was created, leaving a free space in the upper and the lower part, which is the same principle that “Trombe wall” used in passive solar projects. In this way, the oils do not heat up, inside it keeps them all at the same temperature. For this reason, we also chose a cold light to light them from behind. In addition to seeing the real color of each oil, it creates a very singular atmosphere as the light is emitted through the oil test tubes.
The electrical appliances and the furniture that integrate them
All the electrical appliances are new models from Miele. We have a cutting-edge induction hob in white, some ovens, a large capacity fridge, “vinoteca” and a dishwasher. These electrical appliances are integrated into the furniture units that surround the room on each side, and at the same time they are not in your direct view when you enter the space. These furniture units are paneled with ash, integrating different inspection hatches to gain access to both electrical and plumbing installations. That means it is very easy to make changes to these installations, if needs be.
The ceiling: the hanging tray, the mobiles
Another aim was to integrate the technology (which is a lot) and leave some bridges that allow the installations to be enlarged and modified very easily without damaging the space every time. That is why we designed the hanging tray from the ceiling, an accessible floor, while leaving a space in the inside part. The worktop’s legs are communicated directly with this free cavity, which is accessible from the lower part. The tubes that emerge from the central hanging tray had been conceived to house different types of lighting, projectors, cameras, scent spreadings, extraction systems in the kitchen area, etc.
It is a space that is best measured in cubic meters than in square. 235 m3 are completely used, due to the fact that it is possible to work both lengthwise and widthwise, as it is as wide as it is high. In the upper part, on both sides of the central tray, two mechanical arms move back projection moving screens that are used to create different atmospheres and/or to support the images that can be projected onto the table. They can adopt different positions, either close to or far from the guests.
Above the access area, there is also a digital blackboard, that, when it goes down, is placed in front of the furniture unit nearest to the chef’s chair, which allows for punctual theoretical talks.
The sound
Surround-sound speakers in the ceiling and under the table have been installed.
The scents
This has been done through diffusers installed inside the tubes located in the hanging tray. These diffusers are also going to provide the space with the necessary humidity degree, just vaporizing water, without scents. Several scents have been expressly created for this space, as for example the sea smell, or a mushroom and humid grass that will be useful for supporting certain moments.
The curtains and the hands
Three motorized rolls of 220 cm wide x 438 cm high cover the three large windows of the room. Two layers, one of them completely opaque to make the space darker, and another made of translucent screen, which has the printed image of the chef’s hands and it is the one that will be used during the working daytime hours as it it lets the light enter in a sifted way.
The huge pictures of Paco Roncero’s hands manipulating and molding are a clear allegory to the kitchen as transformation, and it was considered from the basic transformation, the most natural that exists, which is water passing through its three states: solid, liquid and gaseous.
Domótica
The installation of a domotic system shows the programmation of different scenes during lunches or dinners, combining lights, sound, projections from the ceiling projectors and the movement of them, projections on the table, different effects, the use of a camera, etc.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
