Biokilab Laboratories

Miñano Mayor, Spain

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Biokilab Laboratories

Miñano Mayor, Spain

Firm

Taller Básico De Arquitectura

Type

Industrial › Research Facility

YEAR

2010

SIZE

25,000 sqft - 100,000 sqft

BUDGET

$500K - 1M

Two boxes in the air and a structure as architecture
The technologic Park of Vitoria colonizes a little bit of nature. The quality of the site and its steepness make us question where to build. Two boxes made from air rise above the slope. The structure become architecture carries on its shoulders these boxes, showing a new plane. This new place is signed by the novelty of the time of this research center. We investigate new ways of entering new places. Our place appears on a new level, determined by a four-legged and colorful structure. Two hollow boxes of concrete inhabit this new place on the structure. The whole complex in a permanent flight reveals a new gravity.
Quadruped anatomies
The metallic structure that raises the boxes in the air is a quadruped structure. Its two horizontal elements form a cross inscribed in the square floor of the boxes. The sides of these floors measure twelve and thirteen meters respectively. The horizontal beams are two IPE 500 where the boxes rest, avoiding any interlocking. Consequently, the structure is visible in its entirety. The ends of the beams join four vertical elements respectively, which become the legs of this quadruped anatomy. Legs are as wide as beams, managing a continuity that makes all the pieces be understood as a unique element. Different lengths of the legs are required because of the elevation of the boxes over the slope, which remains unaltered. Each quadruped structure is painted in deep red.
The structure of the box
Concrete boxes rest on quadruped structures. As mentioned before, these structures avoid the alteration of nature. The box is thought as a second structure that replaces walls with beams and roofs with double slabs. The vertical faces of the box are beams as high as the box. These wall-beams have only one hole, defined by the maximum dimensions that let the beams work properly. The horizontal face of the box is a reinforced double slab. Outside, the concrete structure is visible on all faces of the box. Inside, plasterboards cover the structure. The window frame, drawn as a single line, stays hidden between both sheets. Its disappearance enables a simultaneous lecture of upper and back sides of the box. The gap between sheets, both in walls and slabs, contains all building systems, as plumbing, electricity, voice and data. This net of systems solves the flexibility needed by the laboratory for its continuous transformation.