Selected articles 2009


Over Carthaginian Stones
Museum of the Roman Theater, Cartagena, by Rafael Moneo.
Speech (Moscow. Berlin), 04/2009, pages 138 - 152.

Using what's at hand
Interview with Fernando Menis
Speech 04/2009, pages 220 - 240.

Fernando Menis: "In Turon (Jordánek Concert Hall project, Torun, Poland) we are mixing the concrete with brick from a local factory. We throw the broken brick into the concrete mixer. After it's poured and sets, we break the surface with pneumatic hammers, and a concrete full of large pieces of broken brick emerges."

José María Sánchez García
Design Vanguard feature.
Architectural Record, December 2009, pages 84 - 87.
    
A 250 metros de altura
Ladies & Gentlemen: Architect of the year.
Sacyr-Vallehermoso Tower by Rubio y Álvarez Sala.
Gentleman, December 2009, page 22.

Radiografía de la Actualidad
Introduction to:
Carlos Quintáns Eiras, editor, IV Premio Ascensores Enor, Grupo Asensores Enor SA, Vigo, 2009, pages 23 - 41.

La arquitectura es una negociación entre el presente (en términos de medios y necesidades), el pasado (a través del patrimonio, el territorio, y el legado cultural colectivo) y un futuro que ella misma nos ayuda a definir. El arquitecto es un mediador en ésta negociación, y su papel es tanto interpretativo como creativo. Los proyectos reconocidos por el Premio Ascensores Enor de 2009 son ejemplares en éste sentido, demostrándonos las distintas dimensiones de una arquitectura comprometida con el proceso vital de crear el futuro.

Ein Häus für Gewerkschaften, ein Häus für Unternehmer
Granada Business Confederation and Union Headquarters for Comisiones Obreras (CC OO) and Union General de Trabajadores (UGT), Granada, by Alejandro Muñoz Miranda.
Bauwelt 42.09, November 6, 2009, pages 14 -21.

Church on the defensive
Iglesia de Santa Mónica, Rivas-Vaciamadrid, by Vicens + Ramos.
architektur.aktuell, November 2009, pages 46 - 57.

Die Zauberkiste - the Magic Box
Olympic tennis Center, Madrid, by Dominque Perrault.
architektur.aktuell, October, 2009, pages 54 - 65.

"When seen from inside the vast open spaces of the stadiums, as their movement gradually exposes the infinite blue of Spain's summer sky, the roofs' opening acquires the solemn ceremony of a primitive religious rite.... Well-framed by the elegant formal clarity of Perrault's design, with its clean structural rhythms and luminous spatiality, this unveiling of the celestial sublime packages the sky-viewing epiphanies of American artist James Turrell for a mass audience."

Der Leuchtturm als Ikone
Santa Marta Lighthouse Museum, Cascais, Portugal, by Francisco and Manuel Aires Mateus.
Bauwelt  37.09, October 2, 2009, pages 34 - 39.

"This tension between past and present has been brilliantly addressed by a number of Portuguese architects on different occasions – think for example of the Pousada of Santa Maria do Bouro, where the ruinous state of the original convent is fully legible against Eduardo Souto de Moura's exquisitely minimalist "occupation" of its gutted interior (see Bauwelt 4, January 22, 1999). In the project considered here, the Aires Mateus brothers propose a radically different approach from Souto de Moura's dialogue across time, a solution that carries the site out of time entirely, out of the dialectic between past and present, and situates the work instead in the timeless realm of the icon."

Ein Kreis in den Bäunmen - A Circle in the Trees
Center for Recreational and Sports Activities, Guijo de Granadilla (Extremadura), Spain by José Sánchez García.
architektur.aktuell, September 15, 2009, pages 60 - 71.

Repensar el edfificio en altura
The Tall Building Reconsidered. SyV Tower, Madrid by the Estudio Rubio Álvarez Sala.
    In: Enrique Encabo Seguí, Inmaculada E. Maluenda, editors, Técnica y estrategias: Sobre la construcción de la Torre SyV, Q! Estudio, Madrid, 2009 (September), pages 48 - 53. Text in Spanish and English.

Carlos Rubio and Enrique Álvarez-Sala's approach to the design of the SyV Tower could be described as a search for formal elegance through the logical elegance of their solutions to the technical and programmatic problems that the project presents. Yet this apparently conservative approach, emphasizing formal contention and restraint rather than the liberty of formal invention now customary in contemporary architecture, has given rise to a solution of striking originality. This result is due in great part to the architects' rigorous and non-formulaic study of the problem, and their framing of the problem in its particular, contemporary context, which conditions the solution in new ways.

Museum of Design and Fashion of Lisbon
By Ricardo Carvalho + Joana Vilhena
Architectural Record, September 2009, pages 66 - 71, cover.

In Seville, Lawsuits Threaten to Halt Zaha Hadid Project
Architectural Record web page, September 1, 2009
        
Patio-Block-Spirale
Public housing, Sanchinarro, Madrid by Burgos & Garrido.
Bauwelt 31.09, August 14, 2009, pages 20 - 25.

Retrato de una década prodigiosa
New art museums in Spain and in the world, 1999-2009.
Fuera de Serie No. 245, Expansión, June 26, 2009, pages 54 - 58.

Dubai: Sueños futuristas en el país del oro negro
Gentleman 63, May 2009, pages 90 - 96.

House for a Photographer II by Carlos Ferrater
Architectural Record, April 2009

Holl Wins Half-Million Dollar Spanish Prize
Architectural Record web page, March 16, 2009

Bodegas Protos, Peñafiel, Spain
Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners
Architectural Record, March 2009, pages  92 - 95.

Spain. Construction Grinds to a Halt
Global Report: Recession and Recovery
Architectural Record, March 2009, pages 59 - 60

Keine Kalte Kiste  - Out of the Icebox
Ice Skating Rink, Valdemoro, Spain by Mª Auxiliadora Gálvez and Luca Brunelli.
db - deutsche bauzeitung, March 2009, pages 20 - 26, cover.

Arquitectura en horas bajas
Spanish architects face the economic crisis.
Fuera de Serie, No. 226, Expansión, February 13, 2009, pages 16 - 18; cover.
    
Herzog & de Meuron Designs HQ for Major Bank in Spain
Architectural Record web page, February 8, 2008.

Rafael Moneo, Museum of the Roman Theater of Cartagena
Architectural Record, February 2009, pages 70 - 78.
    
El nuevo candelabro de la Castellana
Towers by Foster, Pei Cobb Freed, Pelli and Rubio - Álvarez-Sala in the "4 Torres Business Area," Madrid.
Fuera de Serie, No. 224, Expansión, January 30, 2009, pages 20 - 22.

"Quizás lo peor de su impacto es su efecto en conjunto. ...cada torre ocupa el mismo volumen de espacio, pero sus diseños son diferentes, y su distribución sobre la plaza de ubicación tampoco es muy regular. De distintas alturas, formas y colores, y con huecos irregulares de espacio entre ellas -huecos que son tan llamativos en el perfil de la ciudad como las torres mismas- se presentan ante nosotros no tanto como hermanas o primas, sino algo así como las cuatro velas de un candelabro que se han ido derritiendo a distintos ritmos."

    
Una fecunda rivalidad
Madrid's City of Justice.
Fuera de Serie, No. 222, Expansión, January 16, 2009, pages 18 - 21.

Madrid’s City of Justice Starts to Take Shape
Architectural Record web page, January 5, 2008.


Photos by David Cohn