School Center Paredes Alenquer by André Espinho

The School Center has been designed to accommodate around 600 children, from the ages of three to nine. Within the school, the children are divided by the 1st cycle, kindergarten and ATL (Leisure Activities). The first floor consists of administration areas, service and a reception for parents whilst the ground floor contains a gymnasium and the majority of the school classrooms, with a direct link to the playgrounds (both covered and uncovered).

School Center Paredes is composed of a white volume resting on four black volumes, thus marking the separation between floors. The majority of the project works around the creation of three patios/playgrounds and the relationship of the building with the slope of the existing ground. Contact with the outside was key to this project, with the organisation and shape of the interior space allowing all circulations to enjoy a large amount of natural light. By including a number of covered outdoor spaces, the building now provides excellent leisure facilities for children in all seasons. Several wall paintings in the playgrounds and atriums were carried out by artists invited by the designer in an attempt to enrich the interior space.

One of the original wall hangings was created by Conceiçao Espinho and Teresa Magalhaes. Built in three major areas, (water, earth and sky) it involves a female figure walking and pushing a cart with a child. This is said to symbolise travel and that she will get to know and face the world that awaits her.

project name: School Center Paredes – Alenquer
function: School – 1st cycle, kindergarten and ATL (Leisure Activities)
chief architect/office name: André Espinho/André Espinho – Arquitectura
project team: André Espinho, Bruno Mendes, Miguel Henriques, Marco Correia
authors of the Interior Wall Paintings: Mariana Fernandes, Virginio Moutinho, André Lemos, Teresa Magalhaes e Conceiçao Espinho, António Moutinho, Francisco Espinho
Client: Alenquer City hall – Portugal
design date: 2004
completion date: 2006/09 (time of construction)
area: 6 700 m2
Photos : FG +SG Fernando Guerra e Sérgio Guerra

Villa 3S by LOVE architecture and urbanism

A gorgeous property on the fringes of Graz Geidorf, a very limiting land-use plan and a very ambitious budget form the starting point for the planning of my own house. Simple yet complex; clear but also playful; light and optimistic; small yet also big. A place that is architecturally distinct, yet eminently livable; unconventional and unique, yet still functional for everyday living – these are the attributes of my family’s future home.

One of the fundamental ideas was to incorporate the relatively large property into the living space, meaning to make the boundaries between house and garden as fluid as possible in order to extend the living space over the entire property. This means as many subtle, boundaries and transitions between the inside and the outside as possible: large-scale vitrification with very large sliding doors; terraces that lead into the property and sheltered areas serve to blur the borders.

The relatively strict land-use plan, which stipulated a saddle roof with a designated inclination, presented a further challenge. A folding begins at the seating platform on the southern terrace over the outside walls, continues over the roof, covers the building structure and thereby forms a “saddle roof” without taking on the appearance of a conventional saddle roof.

This folding spatially differentiates the individual areas, thereby providing more excitement to the entire complex. Due to the spatiality and “perspectivity” created in this way, the house looks different from every angle. The interior rooms will be up to 4 meters tall, which will make the entire house appear much larger.

The interior of the house is centered around one main room for cooking, eating and living. When open, large sliding doors between the individual rooms connect a fluid, complete spatial structure. With the sliding doors closed, each room maintains its intimacy and distinctiveness and also extends to its own outdoor area or access. For example, the bathroom has its own, opaque terrace with an outdoor shower, which can be converted to an interior room with the use of broad folding doors. Weather permitting, the bathroom space can be doubled in this way. The building is a massive brick construction with concrete walls and a reinforced concrete roof. This roof also serves as a thermal storage mass to provide a pleasant indoor climate and is covered with wood outside. This shades the planking and visually blends the terrace and roof into a unified whole.

Year: 2010, planning and completition
Floor Space: 145m2 netto
Costs: 1,725€/m2 gross
Collaborators: construction calculation – Hartmth Petschnigg, building physics – Roland Müller
Fotos: Jasmin Schuller
Materials: concrete, brick, glass (system is self developed), wood cover on the roof (larch),
wood terraces (garapa)
Software: Autocad

source: love-home.com

Rehabilitation of Former Prison of Palencia as Cultural Civic Center

The former Palencia Provincial Prison complex was created at the end of the XIX century, built with brick bearing walls following the “neomudéjar” style, and composed mainly of four two-storey wings and some other with one storey. On this building was planned a comprehensive refurbishment to transform the former use and convert it into a center that promotes the social and cultural activity in this part of the town.

Our proposal intends to convert the former prison into a meeting place, recovering some of the old spaces, and creating at the same time new structures that make possible the new planned activities. It is a project that respects the existing building, which is given a contemporary, lighter appearance, and where the natural light will play a key role.

With this aim the main two-storey wings have been refurbished, emptying their interior and placing a new independent structure to bear the new floors and roofs. Besides, between the main wings have been built new connecting pavilions, which form the new complex perimeter and give it a modern and friendly aspect.

To introduce the light in the building we had to remove the old covered with tiles which were in very poor condition, and have been replaced by others of zinc that open large skylights which introduce light into the open halls of the Center.

The entire building is organized around a great hall that connects the 4 pavilions of the former prison. It is a diaphanous space based only on a few mild cylindrical courtyards of glass that illuminate and provide the backbone of the stay. Due to its central location in relation to the pavilions, this space acts as a nerve center and distributor of users, across the Pavilion access and reception, directed towards the rest of the areas of the Centre.

The hall gives way to the lateral pavilions where the auditorium and various music and art classrooms are. On the upper floor, under a large glass skylights, are two multi-purpose areas dedicated to more numerous groups.

In the area where is the cells of prisoners were, we placed the library. The reading rooms are articulated around a central space of high-rise under a lantern of octagonal shape that acts as a distributor for the different areas and that arrives vertical communication and control areas and offices.

Finally, access to the Centre are carried out through a very light and bright glazed perimeter that pretends to be a filter between the city and the activity of the interior. A structural steel beam travels abroad tying areas glazed with the former factory walls getting an alleged industrial air.

The use of metallic materials in all intervention, as the zinc in facades and roofs, glass and uglass in the lower bodies and skylights and the aluminium lattices as lightfilters also contributes to this.

Architects: Exit Architects: Ánegel Sevillano/José Ma Tabuyo
Location: AVDA. VALLADOLID No 26 34034 PALENCIA
Clients: Ministerio de Fomento, Ayuntemiento de Paleencia
Area: 5.077 m2
Budget: 9.675.038 EUROS
Project date: 2007
Completion date: 2011
Quantity surveyor:Impulso Industrial Alternatiovo. Álvaro Fernández
Structural engineers: NB35. José Luis Lucero
Mechanical engineers: Grupo JG. Juan Antonio Posadas
Light consultant: Manuel Díaz Carretero
Photographer: FG + SG Fotografía de Arquitectura, Exit Architects
Collaborators: Mario Sanjuán, Ibán Carpintero, Miguel García-Redondo, Silvia N. Gómez

source: exit-architects.com