Thursday, July 4, 2013

Constructivism on the Vía Júlia

Photos by DC

The July issue of Architectural Record features my article on rental housing for senior citizens built by the city of Barcelona and designed by a trio of young architects there. It is one of those projects commissioned before the economic crisis and finished after, although unlike many it is occupied and doing well. Its young designers, meanwhile, are doing other things.


From the article (read full text here):
"The design ... starts from a premise as boring as that for a speculative office block: a reinforced-concrete structure with a ... repetitive horizontal ribbons of openings and spandrels finished in white corrugated aluminum. But the architects treat this basic volume as a neutral field over which they deploy a series of variations. The 77 units ... are pulled back behind continuous terraces, converting the facades into a sun screen. Outdoor stairs run down the other two facades, interrupting the spandrel bands with dramatic, Constructivist-looking diagonals that reveal planes of yellow and green behind them...."
Photo © Adria Goula, from Architectural Record
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Torre Julia Senior Housing, Barcelona
By Ricard Galiana, Sergi Pons and Pau Vidal
Architectural Record, July 2013



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