Spain Library Park

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Other Projects by EL EQUIPO MAZZANTI

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Expansion of Santa Fe de Bogotá Foundation

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Spain Library Park

Firm

EL EQUIPO MAZZANTI

Type

Educational › Library

YEAR

2007

SIZE

10,000 sqft - 25,000 sqft

Topography and Geography

Rather than an architectural object, we
pretend to develop a landscape related to geography and urban topography
inserted there in; we search for organizational rules to develop projects that favor a new natural contract. We fold, map, and tear; operations that build
architecture-landscape at the same time, reformulating relations between depth
and figure, an approximation in the search of alternative ideas capable of
favoring that new natural contract tuned with a landscape and a natural
order1.1.1 Program requirements and preconditions.The project is located in one of the hillsides most
affected by the violence in the eighties because of drug trafficking in the
city of Medellin and is part of the social inclusion agenda of the Mayor to
provide equal opportunities in social and economic development to the
population.The competition program called for a multi-building
(library, training rooms, exhibition hall, auditorium and administration) in a
single volume, the proposal seek to divide the program into three groups: the
library, classrooms and offices training, and the audience composed of a lower
platform, allowing us greater flexibility and autonomy in their use, making the
community more participative.
1.1.2 Rationale for compositional solution adopted.Medellin is Geography, is a mountain.The city is located in the northern Andes, in one of the
most broken topography in Colombia, its main characteristic is given by its
mountains and the geography that defines the identity and image of the city, is
what the citizens take as an element of identification. The proposal is related
to the image and identify of the city, through architectural-landscape, part of
its landscape inspires the building to be interpreted as a new topography. Landscape architecture asRather than a building we propose an operational geography
that is part of the valley, as a mechanism for organizing the program and the
area, making the hidden and irregular contours of the mountain to stand out, not
as a metaphor, but as a way of organizing the space in the area, a folded and
clipped building similar to the hills.A landscape Building that redefines the folded structure
of the mountain as form and space, eliminating the idea of landscape as a
background and enhancing the building ambiguity-landscape.
1.1.3 Rationale for urban integration of the proposal.PlaceThis border of the city is composed of complicated paths
product of the slope topography displacement, therefore making it impossible to
have meeting places and plazas. The project is organized under two structures:
the first, by buildings and landscape (rocks) and the second by a platform that
integrates them and transforms it into a deck-plaza that functions as an
outlook towards the valley. The building works as meeting gathering place for
the community, allowing the area to stand out as an icon.
The building as iconThe sector consists of small brick houses caused by self
construction and waste of green areas, resulting from the inability to build on
steeps slopes, this organization produces a uniform texture of the city with no
visible hierarchy. This is why the proposed building seeks to stand out as a building-landscape
icon, constructing the site and maintaining the tension, the geography as an
element of hierarchy and the architecture as a texture.The project is visible from much of the city as a symbol
of the new Medellin, making people able to identify their community and build a
greater sense of belonging. Today it is one of the tourist attractions of the
city.1.1.4 Features general building construction.The project is a double-support structure: the first
consists of an articulated metal membrane that supports and arms the exterior
skin panels; the second is a particular portal concrete frame structure that
makes up the internal volume, dilated from the outer skin, to allow entry of
light from above. The platform consists of a mixed structure of steel columns
and concrete plates, the materials used were, black slate, stained glass and
various wood veneers and stone floors.A regulated temperature mechanism was designed, a
"thermosyphon", through the creation of a system of air circulation upstream
(negative pressure) removing excess of heat and allowing the optimization of
solar energy.
1.1.5 Other aspects.Environment and atmosphere.
The other premise was to design the interior in a way
that would decontextualize the user and bring him out of his immediate poverty environment,
building a warm atmosphere and reflection, based on the light coming from
above, and enabling a suitable environment for reading and studying. That is
why the facade of the building was designed with very small openings (windows)
letting the light penetrate into the interior.