The overall project is a bit like Alain de Botton’s Living Architecture programme of architect-designed holiday homes, except that Solo’s are all in the same 100-hectare location. It also resembles the Serpentine Galleries’ annual architecture pavilion, with the difference that these houses are permanent and habitable. — The Guardian
Just over the border from Catalonia, amid the mountainous landscape of eastern Spain, a new one-of-a-kind development is underway. Including a total of 15 houses and a hotel, each designed by a different architect, Solo Houses was initiated by a Paris-based couple, Christian Bourdais and Eva... View full entry
Based in Madrid and operating globally, The Norman Foster Foundation is a non-profit promoting holistic education and interdisciplinary thinking and research. Followed from the Future is Now forum held in Madrid's Royal Theater on the 1st of June, Mayor of Madrid and Lord Foster brought... View full entry
Almost 20 years since Frank Gehry’s $100m titanium-clad Guggenheim Bilbao opened, another city on Spain’s north coast is getting a major contemporary art centre designed by an internationally acclaimed “starchitect”. — The Art Newspaper
Renzo Piano's first big commission in Spain, The Centro Botín, is opening today. The architect claims that its comparisons with the museum that became a model for culture-driven regeneration schemes worldwide are too simplistic. According the president of the Fundación Botín’s visual arts... View full entry
Archinect's Architecture School Lecture Guide for Winter & Spring 2017Archinect's Get Lectured is back in session for Winter and Spring 2017. Get Lectured is an ongoing series where we feature a school's lecture series—and their snazzy posters—for the current term. Check back... View full entry
Madrid's mayor, Manuela Carmena, is serious about kicking personal cars off the road in the city center.
On a November 5 show on Spanish radio networkCadena Ser, she confirmed that Madrid's main avenue, the Gran Vía, will only allow access to bikes, buses, and taxis before she leaves office in May 2019, as noted by CityLab.
— Independent.co.uk
Are people in love with not having to drive to dense urban locales? (Answer: for the most part, yes.) Following the lead of numerous cities that are seeking either to reduce car traffic or obliterate it altogether, Madrid's mayor actually outlawed personal vehicles from the city's main... View full entry
The mosque-cathedral of Córdoba in southern Spain is one of the great Rorschach tests of medieval architecture. Like the ink blots that psychologists use to divine unconscious thoughts, we tend to see in the building what we please. For some, it embodies the artistic creativity and religious tolerance of the Muslim period. For others, it is a symbol of the conquests and bloodshed that have washed over this region throughout the centuries. — Wall Street Journal
Whichever message we choose, the mosque is surely one of the most beautiful and controversial monuments in Europe today.More religious architecture:Artist catalogs the drab architecture of America's megachurchesAncient Italian church comes back to life – built in wire meshOmaha is... View full entry
The Museo del Prado in Madrid has big plans for its 200th anniversary celebration in 2019. Among those plans is an expansion of the museum campus and the restoration of the historic Salón de Reinos, all of which Foster + Partners and Spanish practice Rubio Arquitectura will be in charge of... View full entry
This post is brought to you by IN(3D)USTRY From Needs to Solutions. The first edition of IN(3D)USTRY From Needs to Solutions, which took place from June 21st to June 23rd 2016 at Fira de Barcelona, successfully introduced an entirely new concept for exploring the possibilities offered by additive... View full entry
In May 2015, the citizen platform Barcelona en Comú (Barcelona in Common) catapulted Ada Colau into power as the city’s first female mayor. Ten months earlier, the group didn’t even exist.
With no money and little experience, just how did they wrest the city from the entrenched political caste that had been running it for the past 40 years? Not surprisingly, Barcelona en Comú has since been inundated with requests for an answer...
— the Guardian
"In response, the group produced a step-by-step explanation – How to Win Back the City en Comú"Barcelona en Comú is a citizen platform launched in 2014 that is the minority government in power right now in Barcelona. Many of its members participated in the 15M movement and come from political... View full entry
In Archinect's latest giveaway, our readers had the chance to win Arquitectura Viva's 2016 Spain Yearbook monograph. The book is a visual throwback of the last 12 months in Spanish architecture, revisiting 24 top-notch buildings that were all completed in the country over the last year.After... View full entry
Arquitectura Viva's 2016 Spain Yearbook is a visual throwback of the last 12 months in Spanish architecture, revisiting 24 top-notch buildings that were all completed in the country over the last year. Recently released by Arquitectura Viva — who previously published monographs on Rem... View full entry
The lady on the ladder chosen as the image for the 2016 Biennale Architettura sees, amidst “great disappointments[,] creativity and hope,” states Paolo Baratta, president of the Venice Biennale. “[S]he sees them in the here-and-now, not in some uncertain aspirational, ideological future.”... View full entry
In the latest attempt from a big city to move away from car hegemony, Barcelona has ambitious plans. Currently faced with excessive pollution and noise levels, the city has come up with a new mobility plan to reduce traffic by 21%. And it comes with something extra: freeing up nearly 60% of streets currently used by cars to turn them into so-called “citizen spaces”. — The Guardian
"The plan is based around the idea of superilles (superblocks) – mini neighbourhoods around which traffic will flow, and in which spaces will be repurposed to “fill our city with life”, as its tagline says."A precedent for Barcelona's superblocks was actually... View full entry
A recently completed restoration project [of Spain's Matrera Castle] has provoked an incredulous reaction from some locals and a Spanish conservation group...
However, Carlos Quevedo, the architect who oversaw the restoration of the castle...pointed out that the project had been painstaking, professional, and legal...'I do think that some basic, accurate information can help avoid some of the prejudices that spring from a simple image.'
— The Guardian
Spain is having another cultural kerfuffle over the recent restoration of the ancient Matrera Castle in Cadiz. While locals and preservation groups are mocking and criticizing the makeover, architect Carlos Quevedo says that it was done to prevent further structural collapse.More about historic... View full entry
Archinect's Architecture School Lecture Guide for Winter/Spring 2016Archinect's Get Lectured is back in session. Get Lectured is an ongoing series where we feature a school's lecture series—and their snazzy posters—for the current term. Check back frequently to keep track of any upcoming... View full entry
