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Projects
Laboratory for Integrated Science and
Engineering (LISE)
If, as many researchers contend, the future of academic science lies in breaking down the barriers between traditional disciplines, a stunning new building beginning to take shape along Oxford Street may become the most forward-looking to grace the Harvard campus - both in form and function. Designed by the celebrated Spanish architect Rafael Moneo, the 135,000-square-foot structure known as the Laboratory for Integrated Science and Engineering, or LISE, provides a physical link between Harvard's physics and Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences (DEAS) communities, along with the Science Center. Architectural highlights include an unusual pearlescent façade that changes subtly with the day's lighting, an underpinning of sculpted pedestals that skillfully preserves campus walkways, and an underground section designed to receive natural light. The Faculty of Arts and Sciences began site preparation for LISE in April and began construction of the foundation in August. LISE is scheduled for occupancy in the fall of 2006. LISE bridgees the gap between McKay, Pierce, Cruft, Lyman, Jefferson, and the Science Center, better integrating the scientific communities in each and replacing a small parking area that previously occupied the site. The new science hub is intended to boost collaboration in the areas of nanoscale and mesoscale science, the study of materials on an atomic scale or slightly larger. The LISE project also indirectly benefits the Department of Music, whose building abuts the construction site: Landscaping that is part of LISE construction is designed to accommodate an outdoor music performance space adjacent to the Music Building.
Also among LISE's most eagerly awaited features is a ground-floor café and patio that give scientists from different disciplines a central place to meet and discuss their work. "This is a major improvement to the backyard of the Science Center," says Professor of Physics Charles M. Marcus, who has been intimately involved in planning for LISE. Laboratories are housed in the one-third of LISE that's aboveground. The three-level basement houses a shared cleanroom (dust-free environment for microlithography and nanofabrication), facilities for materials synthesis, and a microscopy suite - all applications that are best situated far from outside light and vibrations. That's not to say that two-thirds of LISE remain forever dark and gloomy, however: Several ingenious design features serve to bring natural light underground. The aboveground part of the building rests on three hollow pedestals, whose glass exterior walls serve to funnel light to the lower levels. Also, two of the four sides of the underground portion are exposed and lined with windows - essentially creating an L-shaped "moat" or light corridor around the portions of the underground perimeter facing McKay and the Science Center. "What the building really does best of all - and I think Rafael Moneo would agree - is to solve a huge number of technical and logistical problems associated with putting a technically sophisticated building into a dense space, without losing any of its elegance and uniqueness," Marcus says. "It really is a great achievement." The building envisioned by Moneo - winner of the 1996 Pritzker Award, architecture's version of the Nobel Prize - promises to be a masterpiece. Its design succeeds in preserving the integrity of the system of campus "streets" developed decades ago by architect and former Graduate School of Design Dean Josep Lluis Sert. While the building's footprint rests squarely on a well-traveled pathway that proceeds northward across the Cambridge Street overpass and through the Science Center, the path is spared by LISE's placement on the three slender pedestals, which conform exactly to the existing walkway. Because the building hovers atop these pedestals, Moneo - the architect behind the Los Angeles Cathedral, renovations to the Prado in Madrid, and the Davis Art Museum at Wellesley College - avoided a top-heavy stone or brick design that might have been more in keeping with some of the older neo-Georgian structures nearby. Instead, he chose to follow the lead of the mirrored curtain wall of McKay, creating a crystalline, architecturally airy structure in the process. Crisp and gutsy, the ultramodernist structure is clad in a treated multilayer glass that changes color with the sky while avoiding the excessive sparkle and glare sometimes associated with structures sheathed in glass curtain walls. The five-story aboveground portion of LISE nestles into the northwestern corner of McKay, filling the niche between that building, Cruft, and Lyman. The much larger underground portion of the building occupies a more sizable footprint, set beneath the courtyard that now exists between McKay, the Music Building, and the rear of the Science Center. As part of the project, the courtyard surface is regraded flush with the north entrance of the Science Center, eliminating several stairs and further enhancing Sert's "street" linking Harvard Yard with the science buildings further north. LISE is one of a group of new science developments in the North Yard that has pulled Harvard and community residents closer together. This year Harvard and the Agassiz neighborhood formalized a working relationship in a Memorandum of Understanding affirming that new academic facilities can serve both Harvard's and Agassiz's interests so long as significant impacts are mitigated, the community is enhanced, and long-term predictability of future development is established for both the University and community. Among the community benefits negotiated in the memorandum is that Harvard continues to enhance its support of science education in the Cambridge public schools as new science buildings like LISE are created. The Chace Center, Rhode Island School of Design
The contemporary new building destined to become the heart of RISD’s changing campus will be named The Chace Center in recognition of the Chace family’s signature contribution to the project. Known in its early planning stages as the RISD Center, the six-story structure will be built in what is presently a parking lot on North Main Street in Providence, RI. It has been designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect José Rafael Moneo. “The Chace family, and Jane Chace Carroll in particular, are among the most knowledgeable and generous contributors in America,” says RISD President Roger Mandle. “Such a significant contribution from them is a compliment to this important project and to RISD.” Spearheaded by Carroll, this key contribution to RISD’s Future by Design capital campaign comes from her and her two siblings, Malcolm G. (“Kim”) Chace III, who lives in Providence, and Eliot Chace Nolen of New York City. The Chace Center complex will dramatically expand and reorient The RISD Museum, giving RISD an entrance facing downtown Providence. The project also entails restoration of Memorial Hall, a former church dating from 1851, and the Museum’s Radeke Building, added in 1926. With such amenities as a café, an auditorium and new student galleries, the complex is envisioned as a hub where people come and go, stop for coffee, and to talk, exchange ideas and feel refreshed by art. Moneo, the Spanish architect selected for the project, has approached The Chace Center as a way of using architecture to clarify and strengthen RISD’s role in 21st century art and design education. Its lobby will be a crossroads where students and faculty rub shoulders with off-campus visitors, who will no longer need to climb College Hill to enter the Museum or student galleries. Instead, an escalator will lead directly to the special exhibitions gallery, a new entryway to the Museum itself. On the second floor, two spacious galleries will vastly expand campus exhibition space for student work, offering visitors a look at art fresh from RISD’s studios. The third floor of The Chace Center will house a gallery devoted exclusively to special visiting exhibitions or revolving shows from the Museum’s collection of more than 80,000 objects. An atrium for special events will connect the gallery to the main level of the existing Museum complex via a short bridge to the Radeke Building, which will be renovated to open new galleries and create a rational circulation route for visitors. To allow for this, the Museum’s Department of Prints, Drawings + Photographs will move to a specially designed facility on the fourth floor of The Chace Center, giving students and other Museum visitors ready access to one of the largest and most widely studied areas of the collection. The fifth and sixth floors of the new building will house Foundation Studies studios and Liberal Arts classrooms. “This is an extremely intriguing project,” says Moneo. “The Chace Center resists the idea of a single, autonomous building; it has become a way of merging buildings, of giving new value to existing designs and enhancing the space you already have.” President Mandle agrees: “The Chace Center will define the ways in which we work together as a community and determine how RISD is perceived, both internally and internationally.” General and Royal Archive of Navarra, Pamplona
The new Archive of Navarra revives what was the Palace of the Kings of Navarra by renovating a medieval ruin, recuperating a historic fragment of the city as a contemporary building with a modern use as the archive of this northern province of Spain and the depository of its rich history. After being abandoned by the Army, the Palace, after having been centuries earlier a royal residence, became a dismal ruin. With the addition of a new tower and the radical restoration of what remained of the medieval construction, our project sought to return to this collection of buildings the powerful unity they had historically possessed. This idea of an almost fortress like vault seemed appropriate for the program of an archive, the stronghold of a country´s history. The program describes a clear division in use – one being the archive and the other being an academic research center – which corresponded to the distinct building blocks. The restored building contains the administrative and academic activities and the new block provides the required archive space. While the original buildings have been restored using contemporary construction methods, the Gothic windows and the scale of the rooms have been respected in order to evoke the former character of the Palace. Only the crypt survived in its original, and impeccable, condition and it now serves as an exhibit space with vitrines and natural light to allow the public to see period documents almost as they would have been seen centuries ago. Because the damage to the original buildings was so far beyond repair, we made no attempt to 'patch' the existing building. Aside from the crypt, the walls have been completely rebuilt, respecting the profile of the original buttresses. With the addition of the new archival tower, an allusion to the Keep, where the King once had his private apartments, the silhouette of the Palace has been restored, returning to the city of Pamplona a monumental presence essential to its history. Our
Lady of Los Angeles Cathedral
Light is at the origins of the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels. On the one hand, the light reflected from the chapels, captured by the large windows orients us along the path of the ambulatories that take us to the nave; this light is not very different from that that we find in Romanesque churches. On the other hand, the light filtered through the alabaster creates a luminous, diffuse and enveloping atmosphere, in which the constructed elements float, ensuring a spatial experience close to that which we have in various Byzantine churches. Finally the glass cross which presides over the apse lets us understand the light as a mystic metaphor of the presence of God manifested in the rays of sunlight that come to us through it.
The new Cathedral sits in the heart of the city, tangent to the
Hollywood Freeway. Slightly elevated, the parcel dominates its
surroundings, emphasizing the complex's role as an urban landmark
and spiritual center. An esplanade for large congregations of
up to 6,000 people occupies the center of the site with the built
volumes at either end, connected by colonnades that define the
edges of the plaza. The Cathedral occupies the higher end, its
front facade at a slight angle with the lot's long axis. The bell
tower rises at the corner, set apart from the church by a trapezoidal
cloister projecting into the esplanade lined by palm trees. At
the opposite end of the site are the bishop's residence and facilities
for the archdiocese, two volumes that defer to the sculptural
mass of the temple. Cranbrook Academy of Arts Studio Addition
Cranbrook was founded in 1904 by the magnate George Booth, owner of the Detroit News, with the intention of creating an institution where education would not forget nature. Mr. Booth also understood that applied arts should be included in the fine arts. He entrusted the Academy of Fine Arts to Eliel Saarinen who began working for Cranbrook in 1925 where he put down roots, building his house and sending for the Swedish sculptor Carl Miles to collaborate with him in the creation of an academic complex in which they hoped that beauty would prevail. At Cranbrook Saarinen built between 1925 and 1950 various studios, dormitories, schools and finally a museum and a library. Taking advantage of the professors who worked with him at Cranbrook, he introduced countless furnishings, textiles, ceramics and decorative elements to his buildings that bear witness to what was considered modern in America during those years. The present project is part of an initiative to complete and improve the campus installations that began ten years ago when Lilian Bauder, president of Cranbrook Educational Communiity, commissioned this project for the creation of new installations for three departments: ceramics, art and textile and metalworking. The major interest lay in the site available for the new building, a site that was next to the museum designed by Saarinen, and this project can be understood as its extension. The first concern of the designers was to find out what kind of building could coexist next to the resonant volume of the museum. Renouncing strategies that would have led to reinforcing the symmetry established by the lovely and monumental fountain dedicated to the Rape of Europa by Carl Miles, this proposal understands that the integrity of the fountain should be maintained, as it is today, and that the building, in continuity with the museum of Saarinen, can still give rise to an autonomous episode that will create a space in the form of an open plaza in which the existing parking, the Lion’s Gate leading to the entry platform shared by the library and the museum and the access to the new departments all converge. Studying the plan one can appreciate the intention of the architects to integrate the back of the museum – including the Lion’s Gate as the most relevant episode – into the new building while at the same time maintaining complete visual autonomy from the fountain, the Rape of Europa. In this way the new addition becomes literally the new entrance to the Academy that celebrates and takes advantage of the aura of the fountain. Two observations can be made about the floor plan. One is the importance of the transition piece in the ground floor as well as in the upper floor where galleries for exhibiting student work are to be installed with the intention that their work will be seen in continuation with the pieces presented in the museum. The other is that the work spaces for the students and the studio for the artist in residence use the same equipment for the development of their work thereby stimulating the proximity between students and faculty that has always been characteristic of this Academy. Concerning the character and expression of building, an attempt has been made on the one hand to maintain the industrial aspect of the studios designed by Saarinen, and on the other not to alter either the scale or the materials that have served the Academy, with special attention paid to the landscaping. Perhaps the project will be completed with the needed addition to the museum. Chivite Winery At the end of the 80´s the Chivite family bought the property known as “Señorío de Arínzano” located in the township of Aberín, district of Estella that extends along on both sides of the meandering river Ega. Among the structures that have been built over the years, the most outstanding are the Palace of the Commander of the Arsenal, crowned by statues carved in stone; a small neo-classical church dating from the early XIX c.; and a XVIII c. manor house. The new winery incorporates the three above mentioned structures: The Tower, the Manor and the Church dedicated to St. Martin The new buildings are arranged in an arc that encloses and embraces these existing structures.
These new buildings reflecting the wine making process include:
The new winery is built with concrete walls, hammered and worked so that in a short time they will acquire a patina resembling stone. Wood was used for the windows and the roof structure, finished with copper on the outside. The bodega has been equipped in accordance with the most advanced techniques. The family of Julian Chivite Marco, in whose memory the winery was built, has spared nothing in order that the wines bearing the name “Señorío de Arínzano” do justice to these lovely vineyards, forming part of a landscape, that manifests the history of the place. The Audrey Jones Beck
Building
The Museum of Fine Arts in Houston was built in 1924, following the design of the architect William Ward Watkin. Much later, Mies van der Rohe built extensions, first in 1958 and again in 1974. The architecture of Mies prevailed, and today the modest and dignified architecture of the first museum has been absorbed in the severe and dark metal framework of the German master. The Audrey Jones Beck Building provides additional exhibition spaces for the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts. The new building is joined to the actual museum by an underground exhibition gallery/passage; however, the new building cannot be considered an extension in the most literal sense of the word. Located on Main Street, which connects the downtown with the Medical Center, the Audrey Jones Beck building is a seperate and autonomous building and should be understood as such. The new building is built on a rectangular parcel defined by Main Street, Fannin Street, Binz Avenue and Ewing Avenue. In spite of the apparent homogeneity of the street grid, a study of the surrounding neighborhood yields an appreciation for certain aspects of the site. The orientation of the new building was the first design decision. The Audrey Jones Beck Building opens onto Main Street and makes it the dominant orientation, not only because Main Street is a street of crucial importance in the city, but also because placing the principal facade on this street pays homage to and establishes a necessary relationship with the existing museum designed by Mies. In Houston, buildings are perceived from the automobile. The front view of a building, experienced by those on foot, is not possible. Therefore, is difficult to apply the same criteria as when considering the building as an object with a well-defined image. Such considerations let the Audrey Jones Beck Building occupy nearly all of the land available, without falling into the temptation of artificial fragmentation. In this way we explored the potential of a compact architecture built within tight confines. Architects always strive to build within the restrictions imposed by the regularity of an area. It is desirable to enclose the largest possible volume in the smallest possible surface area. Compact architecture demonstrates that it is possible to break a regular surface into a whole series of figures that define rooms and corridors, stairs and openings, galleries and light courts, etc., filling the space with admirable continuity and contiguity without submitting to a pre-established "parti." Compact architecture gives rise to saturated, dense floor plans that make use of the interstitial spaces of architectural programs. The Museum of Fine Arts in Houston is a clear example of this understanding of architecture. Thus the floor plan of the museum is "broken" into a whole series of rooms and galleries, connected by means of a hidden path, that without being imperious, guides the visitor's steps. The Museum makes intense use of the natural light that illuminates the rooms and galleries from above. The variety of the galleries is reflected in the fragmented and broken outline of the roof. The roof becomes the most characteristic image of the museum, showing the importance given to the light, the real protagonist of an architecture whose substance is found in the interior space. Museums of Modern Art and Architecture
The site selected for the new Museum of Modern Art and the Museum of Architecture is on the island of Skeppsholmen, in the space left by the demolition of the pavilion of the former Museum of Modern Art and the open area in front of the Tyghuset. Further development of the program for the Museum of Architecture brought about the proposal of a new wing for the museum adjacent to the gymnasium that allows for the incorporation in the museum complex of building 129, situated on the Svensksundsvägen. This particular site was considered for various reasons. The fact that the highest level of the island possesses the necessary surface area for the horizontal layout of the museum proved favorable for the development of the program and also facilitated the construction of a building that would have a minimal impact on the fragile and delicate architecture of the island. The selected site also allowed for a double access to the museum, taking advantage of the difference in level between the Exercisplan and the Slupskjulsvägen. No other place on the island seemed equal to this one in terms of respecting the surroundings and providing the special functions a modern museum must offer the public. The character and expression of the building evolved from the consideration for the content of the collections of the two museums. Diversity is the most outstanding characteristic of the collections. On the one hand, the Moderna Museet should conserve and present to the public its valuable collection of contemporary Swedish paintings and sculpture. On the other hand, the museum also possesses extremely important examples of avant garde works of the '50s, '60s, and '70s, including critical pieces by the most prominent artists of this epoch. These works deserve to be displayed in a dignified space worthy of their importance. At the same time, emphasis was placed on the large space which will house the temporary exhibitions, as well as on the complex program which characterizes the Museum of Architecture. In addition to this diversity, the architecture of the new museums responds to the delicate surroundings and does not fall into the temptation of "monumentality," while at the same time establishing a dialogue—always in a light and discrete manner—with an environment in which fragmentation and minimal intervention are the most typical characteristics. Accordingly, the architecture is discontinuous, broken, as is the city of Stockholm, always respecting and incorporating a geography rich in accidents to which the architecture adapts, creating a picturesque and lively atmosphere that is, fortunately, never artificial. Of critical importance in the making of an architecture with these characteristics that simultaneously serves the required program is the form of the exhibition halls—a key element in a building of this type. They are a mix of square or rectangular halls in which a pyramidal ceiling provides both good illumination and the right height, something we judge to be fundamental for the museum. City Hall Extension,
Murcia
A new building containing municipal offices literally fills a void on the historic Cardinal Belluga Plaza facing the majestic facade of the Cathedral of Murcia. Understanding that the Plaza embodies the celebratory spirit of the baroque, the building is content in its role as a spectator, not seeking the status of protagonist held by the Cathedral and the Cardinal Belluga Palace. In the plaza that manifests the importance of the Church and its power in the 18th century, the new extension to the City Hall represents the authority of the citizens. The facade, like a Spanish reredos, is organized as a musical score, accepting the imposed order of the horizontal levels of the floor slabs. It resists symmetries and offers the balcony of the gallery as the key element, resting on exactly the same horizontal plane as the central balcony of the Palace of Cardenal Belluga. The lateral facades, more discreet, with understated openings, abide by the dimensions of the streets. Arenberg Library, Catholic University
of Leuven (Belgium)
In 1997 the remains of the Celestine Convent were floating like a ship adrift between the roads and highways connecting the city of Leuven with its surroundings. The unmasted ship, once a living monastery, appeared to have lost its way, making it difficult to understand the meaning of the ruined cloister. With the disappearance of the church, three sides of the cloister remained. Brick prevailed, as did the pitched, slate roof. From the beginning the goal was to maintain the scale and the character of the place and make the tiny cloister the core of the new library. The design strategy relied on erecting a new building – not high, not mimetic – that would enclose the cloister. The organic geometry of this construction invigorates and animates the severe cloister and provides an unexpected space, a new courtyard, flanked by the restored dependencies of the monastery. The extension of the building mass containing the open stacks in the basement and the ground floor levels defines a new perimeter along the De Croylaan Road, anchoring the Celestine Convent once again to the road network. As a result of this strategy the existing volumes maintain their value and the rooftop of the old refectory continues to be the most striking element. The old monastery is a building rescued, one that has been newly integrated in the life of the city and of the University. The new Library reminds us that our present is written on the past, something always manifestly present in a city like Leuven and in a University that is one of the oldest in Europe.
Kursaal Auditorium and Congress Center
The beauty of San Sebastián is largely due to its environment, to its landscape. Few cities are endowed with more favorable natural conditions. The site of the Kursaal Auditorium and Congress Center at the mouth of the Urumea River is a geographical accident and must remain as such. Hence, Moneo proposed to erect a building that would not violate the presence of the river in the city. The auditorium and the congress hall, the key programmatic elements of the scheme, are conceived as separate autonomous volumes, as two gigantic rocks stranded at the mouth of the river forming part of the landscape rather than belonging to the city. All other facilities—the exhibition halls, meeting rooms, offices, a restaurant, and musicians' services—are located in the platform, the base that gives due importance to the cubic volumes.
The first "stranded rock" that contains the auditorium measures approximately 60 by 48 by 27 meters and celebrates its character of quasi-geographical accident with a slight inclination towards the sea. The volume of the 1,880-seat auditorium is inscribed asymmetrically inside the glass prism, seeming to float within it. The asymmetry is oriented in such a way that a visitor entering the foyer is unconsciously led towards the highest level where Mount Urgull and the sea in all its splendor can be contemplated from a singular window. This window punctures the building's double wall, composed of a steel skeleton clad inside and out with special, laminated glass elements. The result is a neutral and luminous interior space whose only contact with the outside world is through the foyer window. Outside, the glass surfaces protect against salt-laden winds from the sea, making the volume a dense, opaque, yet changing mass by day, and a mysterious and dazzling source of light by night. Similar design and structural criteria have been used in planning the smaller congress hall, the second "stranded rock," which is also inscribed in an inclined prism measuring 42 by 36 by 24 meters. The asymmetry here is less evident, but the view from the foyer of Mount Ulía and the sea in the background is just as spectacular. The complementary program for the celebration of congresses as well as the exhibition hall, offices and parking for 500 vehicles is placed in the levels below grade, respecting the perimeter and making use of interstitial spaces. Pilar and Joan Miró
Foundation
The construction of the Pilar and Joan Miró Foundation in Palma de Mallorca was made possible thanks to the generosity of Pilar Juncosa, the widow of the artist, who wanted to realize the desire that Joan Miró expressed in his will, which was to donate the studio of Son Abrines and an important part of his work to the city in which he lived so many years. From the beginning, the foundation contained a center for scholars and artists. The new construction was conceived taking into account the powerful presence of the artist's studio (the work of Josep Lluís Sert) and of the house built for Pilar and Joan Miró by the architect Juncosa, both situated on a pleasant south-facing slope, with views of the bay of Palma, on land belonging to an 18th century house that gave the property its name, Son Abrines. The design of the new building reacts energetically to the degeneration of the site caused by cheap construction and negligent real estate speculation of the 1970s, and for that reason the foundation takes on forms similar to those of a fortress or citadel. To recuperate the lost presence of the sea—now blocked by the zone's over-development—the roof of the gallery was transformed into a floating pool. The water and the gardens surrounding the foundation were also planned to act as buffers against the hostile environment. Accordingly, the architecture deliberately ignores its surroundings. The windows are protected by concrete louvers and an alabaster membrane filters the light transforming the heavy walls into weightless screens. The low windows force visual contact with the garden where examples of Miró's sculpture appear with the dense Mediterranean vegetation. The new gallery attempts to capture the character of the of the work of Miró that has always celebrated liberty and life. Moneo wanted the unique, singular and non-repeatable character of the artist's work to find an appropriate atmosphere in the indefinable and broken condition of the gallery. Davis Museum &
Cultural Center, Wellesley College
The Jewett Art Center is undoubtedly one of Paul Rudolf's finest works. Here his admiration for Wright and for Italian architecture is masterfully revealed, yet without mitigating the building's contribution to the configuration of the beautiful open space of the Wellesley College campus. The site for this museum and film center was a small parking lot behind the Jewett Art Center, so the magnitude of the program called for a high-rise construction from the very start. Dialogue between the new center and the Jewett building became the leitmotiv of the project. Such a dialogue immediately implied the creation of an open interstitial space, which then was quickly conferred into the role of a square. Presiding over the square is the new museum, a vertical mass that confidently asserts its presence and becomes the dominant element of the overall space, engaging in conversation with the keel of the Jewett library. However, the dimensions of the museum are tempered by the volume of offices and services connecting it to the Jewett Center by way of a ramp, and by the irregular mass of the movie theater, which adapts to the geometry of the surrounding roads and subtly relates to Rudolph's building by following one or another of its directrixes. The volume of the museum or, better said, the almost cubic space, has been treated with rigor and precision. It is common practice in the history of architecture to cut a square or a cube into sections. Here this is done in an elemental manner, and efforts are made to avoid the idea of a center in favor of upward movement, toward the source of light, which hence becomes the true protagonist of the space. The double staircase divides the floor plan asymmetrically. In this way it offers two alternatives for circulation and imposes its own law in the placement of the various exhibition levels. The verticality imposed by the limited size of the lot has been translated to compactness. Yet the immediate adjacency of the halls, a result of such compactness, does not render them overly close to one another. For the double stairway increases the distance between each hall and the one immediately above it, producing the intervals necessary for the display of such a diverse collection of art works. Upon reaching one landing the visitor finds himself on the first floor, where two halls designated to display modern paintings (of the 19th and 20th centuries) are complemented by two others, one for African art and the other for contemporary art. A mezzanine floor accommodates offices and a study room, and it is on this level that the connection to the Jewett Art Center is produced. The second story is reserved for the Renaissance and Baroque collections, in addition to Oriental art. In these halls the sunlight streams in not only from the top of the atrium, but also through the slits running parallel to the walls. The top floor, basking in the full splendor of the skylights, will house a rich collection of sculptures, with its windows offering views of the entire campus. diagonal Block L'Illa
The site occupied by the L'Illa today was once a vacant lot between the part of the city which remains true to the Cerdá Plan, and therefore respectful of the concept of continuity which accompanies the idea of closed building, as well as that other city, the fruit of planning in the sixties and seventies characterized by discontinuity and open building. The filling of this empty space, transforming it into a nexus between the above-mentioned sectors of the city, became the premise which gave form to the project and from which the urban strategy of the proposal was developed. Winner of an international competition in 1986, the project was based on the construction of a longitudinal building parallel to the diagonal with a park behind which a hotel was to have been erected and where a convention center and some schools are now being built. It was no easy task to construct a building more than 300 meters long. In order that such an important volume would not be perceived as an undifferentiated mass, both the plan and the profile are broken and segmented, and the building is perforated by passageways in those places responding to a variety of urban circumstances. The tangential views which one frequently has of the building led to the design of a system of setbacks which produce the virtual reduction of its mass. The building profile, on the other hand, addresses the hierarchy of the cross streets, and the greater height on Numancia Street is oriented in such a way that the slender facade celebrates entry into the city. At a time when postmodernism appears to have run its course and the neo-technological alternatives produce buildings of dubious image and poor function, the L'Illa embraces the values of an architecture dedicated to city building which are expressed by enhancing the most characteristic elements of the language of modern architecture. This emphasis led to design of the masses with an almost sculptural control, and to the importance given to a spatial vision apparent in the above-mentioned passageways as well as in the gallery, where changes in scale along with a certain taste for discontinuity and diversity predominate. The multiplicity of uses in the building—offices, "aparthotel," commercial center—makes itself felt in the design, and an examination of the floor plans and sections reveals to what extent the architectural solutions respond to the suggestions inherent in the program. A discreet but conscious version of the idea of a building as a simple container, so much in use nowadays, remains throughout the project. Extension to the Atocha
Railway Station
The determination of the Spanish Ministry of Transportation to carry out a total overhaul of the old Atocha Station and quadruple its capacity, and the proposal put forward by City Hall in the Master Plan to free the Glorieta de Carlos V from an existing traffic overpass, are the two poles around which the complex urban piece we might call "Operation Atocha" revolves. The old canopy, the station square, the commuter train station, and the long distance train station make up the principal elements of the project. The old canopy built by Alberto del Palacio is conserved in its entirety and accommodates all of its former services and activities. Its exterior image has been reinforced by the erection of a clock tower over the station square. The station square is a pleasant open space, enriched by a high turnover of pedestrians and a rich and varied commercial activity and by the beauty of the old station, which can now shine in all its splendor.
Commuter train station. The intercambiador is in fact the key architectural piece of Operation Atocha. Its exterior image, resembling a lantern, emerges as a testimony to the complex architecture existing beneath the 628.50-meter level. From afar it acts as a landmark to orient travelers, its assertive, cylindrical form acting as a necessary point of encounter between the diverse factories of the Atocha quarter. Long-distance train station. It was decided that the design of the roof should be closely linked to the pattern of the tracks, for reasons ranging from volumetric discretion—so as not to compete with the scale of the grand old station—to constructive considerations—a solution involving a large-span structure would not have been compatible with the foundations and the dense traffic network beneath. In addition, strictly formal and aesthetic reasons lead one to think that the roof of a modern-day station should reflect, more than anything else, the weight of its surface and the enormous size of the railway yard. Parking. The roof of the commuter station gives rise, at the 624.30-meter level, to a parking lot for 669 vehicles. In addition there are two parking areas around the long-distance station zone. The National Museum
of Roman Art
Mérida was the most important city in Spain at the end of the Roman Empire. The presence of the Theater and the Arena stand out among the ruins of its past. Not far from these monumental relics is the site for the museum. The first intention of the project was to build a museum which would offer to the people of Mérida an opportunity to recover the lost presence of the Roman town over which the new city had been built. Moreover, a certain will to recall and evoke the Roman past can be felt in the project: the museum, without falling into a strict imitation of Roman architecture, tries to suggest to the visitor how the Roman Mérida was in its time. The desire to approach the Roman world that is the basis of the project is satisfied by literally adopting Roman construction systems and not by merely applying moldings and orders.
For that reason, the Roman construction system—massive masonry-bearing walls filled with concrete—has given rise to a building in which the structure of the walls gives formal support to the architecture, an architecture of walls, in which the problem of intervals, proportions, and openings are the key elements. A system of parallel walls is hollowed out by means of a large arch, forming a virtual perspective, a nave that is the main space for some of the museum's the most valuable pieces. The translucent white marble of the relics may be seen in dialectical interplay with the material presence of the brick wall in so far as the natural illumination entering through skylights in most cases stimulates the dialogue between the works of art and the walls. The crypt clearly shows the museum's proposal to uncover the presence of the old Roman city. |
