Poblenou, a former industrial district of Barcelona, has been transformed in the 22 @ technology district during the last decade: a new model of compact city, where innovative companies co-exist with research, training and tech transfer centers, as well as housing, facilities, green areas and industrial heritage. Gaes, a hearing aid company in the 22 @, represents the case of an old Catalan industry in Poblenou that has become during the same period a multinational corporation with an industrial integrated model of research, clean production and marketing.
A hearing aid device is very sophisticated product. Very different from old trumpets, it incorporates a customized chip adapted to each user. Production use microscopes in a white laboratory-like spaces and generates no waste: the type of industry that could be perfectly integrated into the city. The building conceptually and formally responds to these conditions of high sophistication, precision and cutting edge technology integrated into the architecture in terms of sustainability and energy efficiency. The facade is a living skin of mobile sunscreen glass louvers domotically controlled by a central system associated to weather. It is analogous to a sunglasses solar clip that dynamically protects from sun.
The location of voids is one of the main strategies of the interior layout. The first one is a triple height lobby at the main entrance. A second larger void, the atrium, connects all floors. It collects light from the deck through two large skylights and leads it to the ground floor with slight reflections in the glass with different degrees of transparency and translucency. The skylights form in the top floor two suspended courtyards creating a play of reflections and transparencies between the exterior and interior.
