REFURBISHMENT OF COMMERCIAL

Commercial premises in Palma de Mallorca
Year 1999
GROC I BLAU

The project here had to deal with the implantation of an establishment aimed at the commercialisation of furniture and designer lamps within a complex pre-existing container, the result of an overlapping process of different building sequences, in which we find a desultory emergence of architectural fragments and presences from different construction periods in the history of the building: a rounded arch on the upper floor and a sandstone vault, which corresponds to the building’s former cistern, constitute the most significant pre-existences.

The whole project is based on a fundamentally dynamic starting point, with much importance given to the conception of the overall route and the stairs that solve the issue of communication between the various interior levels.

A light stairway of metal stringers and teak wood steps makes it easier to gain access to the upper level from the entrance area; under this, there is a solid staircase that makes it possible to access the lower bay of the semi-basement, while a wide stairway communicates the lower landing with the former sandstone cistern.

Two elements aid the unitary understanding of the interior space: the incorporation of horizontal teak wood planes, which will extend the stops of the interior stairs and the stone covering on the side wall supporting the stairs, which decomposes with the upward movement of the winged bulbs.

From the outside access, a play of visual relations is thus established by means of the use of materials: the horizontal wooden planes are for organising the circulations and connecting the various levels of the premises, while that stone plane searches for the other planes in respective volumes that have altered the original structure of the arch and the vault.