A soccer field has a fundamental and obvious function: to play soccer. But it also has two more functions that are not so evident but no less important. The first has to do with representation. A soccer field has become a work with certain iconic potential for the city. It can be a landmark, a building that is important not only for its quantitative characteristics, but also for its qualitative ones, a container for the dreams of the people. The second aspect stems from an obvious question: An area with the dimensions of a soccer field takes up a great expanse, which is used only on occasion. Doesn’t this result in a waste of space? The answer is clearly yes.
Article source: Santiago de Molina + Hayden Salter + Agatángelo Soler + Edgar Sarli
The apartment building with 30 rental units for young people is located at the eastern edge of the Carabanchel development. Like other new urban districts in Madrid, this zone is characterized —with its oversized street grid, isolated buildings, unoccupied parcels, empty apartments and vacant shops— by the abrupt change from the booming market of 10 years ago to the present economic crisis.
The planning regulations require the creation a free, unbuilt space within the plot. This premise led us to believe that the most suitable design for the morphology of the plot, which was quite rectangular, was a courtyard at the back of the plot. Thus, the building is inserted between two living spaces: one outside, which is the street, and one more intimate, which is the courtyard.
After a long search in the surroundings of Madrid I found a plot with special characteristics that excited me from which the project would come up. Large blocks of natural marble emerged from the steep slope. The views over the mountains of Madrid from there were amazing. All these qualities turned into my personal inspiration for the spaces of the housing, both exteriors and interiors.
This is a strange commission: A “culture ark” in order to retrieve civilization after the 2012 apocalypse.
Located at a mountain slope in Sierra Nevada, Spain, and promoted by Belgian foundation, we were asked to develop the spatial concept to ensure the survival of 20 families and thousands of books for three years.
What the construction of the new Shelter Home for the Homeless offers, beyond satisfying the needs of shelter and food for the residents, is an opportunity for improving the quality of life of a socially excluded group, whose needs reach further than the simple fact of finding a place to sleep.
The Truffle is a piece of nature built with earth, full of air. A space within a stone that sits on the ground and blends with the territory. It camouflages, by emulating the processes of mineral formation in its structure, and integrates with the natural environment, complying with its laws.
Trufa Vaciado Interior (Image Courtesy Roland Halbe)
When we were asked to designed a store we started to dream… Camper has much to do with “el campo”, that is the countryside, the fields… to walk in the fields… and so we imagined shoes stepping on irregular surfaces, like when we walk on earth.
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