SOCIAL ATRIUM

José Hevia

• Architects

This mixed-use building combines social rental housing with a programme of amenities on the ground floor, which houses a multipurpose hall and changing rooms for the adjacent sports courts, and a naturally ventilated car park.

The volume determined by planning initially combined an arrangement of four homes per landing on the six floors of the tower block and a central walkway with eight homes on the first four floors. One home is eliminated to give the building shared communal areas, creating access to the terrace on the fifth floor and the belvedere on the tenth, producing a total of 54 homes.

A bioclimatic atrium at the centre of gravity of the building provides light and ventilation, enhancing the walkway and at the same time guaranteeing crossventilation in all the homes. The atrium functions as a solar collector in winter, reducing the form factor of the building, whereas in summer it acts as a solar chimney, increasing the dissipation surface. An air intake vent on the first floor of the north façade ensures the renewal of air in the atrium.

The materiality of manual brick fired with biomass gives the atrium inertia and serves to design lattice walls that offer privacy, ventilation of the atrium and anti-intrusion mechanisms on the ground floor. The continuity of the material in the atrium generates an outdoor atmosphere that enhances the intermediate spaces.

The structure of 10-metre bays makes for an open floor plan where the bathroom and kitchen are arranged next to the party wall to make the rest of the floor flexible, offering three possible layouts and three different ways of living. The conventional layout with the living room in the corner separates the daytime and nighttime areas, whereas a layout that groups the bedrooms in the corner, differentiating the kitchen-dining room area from the living room, prevents the functions of different spaces interfering with each other. An intermediate option positions the living room in a central position to create two differentiated but visually connected spaces. These layouts allow crossventilation through the daytime area.