- FM: This relates to another constant in RCR, the predominance of low buildings. Even the hotel you made in Dubai, a low slab among enormous buildings. - Again, why should it be that way? The Bab Al Jinan Hotel (2008) relates to the place where it’s located. It reflects on what the Arab world is, with the existence of patios, shade, the souk and alleyways. What makes no sense is to make glass towers there, it is tremendously absurd. The Arab world is about small enclosures, of pathways. I don’t understand why you can’t make contemporary architecture while maintaining the atmosphere and good traditional features. They sought us for our atmospheres, believing that we were able to create buildings that respected their way of life in a contemporaneous manner. The atmosphere is essential in our architecture. - CAU: The Plaça Europa office building is a different architectural expression. How does the creative freedom RCR defends play in an urban context and strict conditions? - It was so strict even the setbacks on the building were defined by regulations. It is by the same developer who commissioned the Agbar Tower by Jean Nouvel and he wanted HIS OWN building. The only way we had to respond to the site was to understand it, so the piece was to belong to the place. Any of the other buildings in Hospitalet can be placed anywhere you want, however, our piece is the only one that cannot be removed, it belongs to this place, because we joined structure, form and facade in a single gesture, the steel plates directed towards the center point that organizes the whole Plaça. Again we pondered on what is an office building, and for us the glazed element is not what defines the inside and the outside. There is a consideration on what
is a facade here, we endowed it with depth and created a shading device, we gave an answer to the site and its conditions. The facade can’t lose what it was. Today we think that glass solves everything, but time will come when we will make façades with depth again. This building achieved LEED Silver. YB: This relationship with nature is particularly impressive in Casa Rural (or Bell-Lloc Winery, 2003), where you claim to have “de-urbanized” the place. Explain this concept to us, so opposed to what we architects do, which is precisely to urbanize. - Many of our proposals have almost no external presence; you can pass outside and not see them. What interests us is what is on the inside. In the 60s and 70s people urbanized the agricultural landscape with curbs, canals, streets, walls. Now we must start removing layers and recovering the essence of places, which is clearly expressed in the Bell-Lloc sections. Let’s go back to the pavilions of Les Cols: originally there was an orchard, there was no outward gaze, no ‘place’. But you can create it by creating a concept. - CAU: In your projects we often find opposing light, Windows that face each other on all volumes. What does this respond to? - We are interested in spaces with depth, with no boundaries, a space that mentally flows. We do it from a sustainability point of view, as well as not to establish limits. We can see it in the windows of Casa Rural, also in the curtain of the Entremuros House, which blurs the boundaries. These are landscapes. We have looked at ourselves through the landscape for a long time and from that knowledge we make our architecture. What we do is bring all this learning from the outside into what architectural space is.
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