Rosselló
The project consists in the complete refurbishment of an apartment of about 100m2, in the Eixample area of Barcelona.
The geometry of its original plan layout responded to the building typology of the Eixample, with load-bearing walls parallel to the façade and the distribution of the rooms to each side of a long corridor. At the same time, though, it was partially determined by the fact that it is a corner building, which means that the entrance space is rotated 45º relative to the rest of the apartment.
The main strategy of the project was to enhance these different geometries to allow visual continuity and greater amplitude of space, by defragmenting the excessive compartmentalization. Partition walls were removed (bearing walls were not modified in any case) and the bathrooms and the kitchen were redistributed around one of the inner courtyards, so that the spaces or rooms are concatenated and the idea of a long corridor is destroyed. The needs of the client and future user, who would be living alone or with a couple, influenced decision making: less rooms, and bigger.
The presence of the original building components was especially important to preserve the atmosphere of an Eixample apartment. The suspended ceiling, with its existing cornices, was kept were possible, and the wooden balcony doors were restored. The windows that had to be changed and the interior doors that had no use anymore were recycled into the enclosures of a new piece of furniture.
The hydraulic tile floor, which had been covered for years with another ceramic pavement, is recovered and reattached following new guidelines: it is maintained as it was in the living room and dining room, while in the rest of the apartment it is combined with an oak parquet flooring, with the intention to create “carpets” that point out some of the liveable areas and suggest paths.
This old materiality is complemented with some made to measure furniture, which shows autonomy from the original structure with its curved shapes and directs the user through the space. These are various tables made with recycled teak wood and a big piece of furniture situated at the entrance of the apartment, and which has a double function of bookshelves and coat wardrobe on the outer side and closet for the master bedroom in the inner side. Its height emphasizes the will of a fluid space as it doesn’t reach the ceiling, which allows the visual continuity of the ceiling structure of ceramic vaults and wooden beams, which in this part of the apartment is left uncovered.
September 2011 - July 2012
