All part of the need for intervention and the small Catholic chapel vernacular located in the south of the city, building by its multiple functional deficiencies and construction problems made him a piece progressively less useful.
The project despite its small area was submerged in challenges, same that took place at the customer's expectations, and who mainly demanded finding a piece that was interpreted as an icon of the area, in addition to expressing contemporary character, it they rubbed with conservative environment harbored the building. The existing structure also aggravated the situation, should be respected as much as possible. The main entrance giving off the sun set, and what issues should be kept sacred space. Well the list of problems seemed to go. So we chose a particular design process, where all existing information to defragment then unite again piece by piece with their respective solution. Compliance resulting from these expectations satisfactor expected.
As for the morphology of the building is given from above and all this defragmentation before finding a rational and refined architecture that expresses emotional and strengthen the analysis put into each piece, before expressing her manufacturing.
To mention some of the proposed solutions. In the proposed solar analysis gate group capable of rotating 360 degrees and which function as a shutter system. Thus achieving direct control entry to the enclosure sunlight in hours undesirable. This system was also implemented in a set of walls in the multipurpose room to not allow the setting affect us.
At the back of the chapel was proposed a cube of light, in addition to his duties bioclimatic increases the brightness on the board, leaving the altar as the protagonist of the space. Regarding the integration of the building, we proposed the purity of white and deep beauty, but yet we needed something richer in texture and color, so we looked at the composition of the environment, and ended up listening to the voice of a spectacular aqueduct with stoneskin that was just 100 meters away. So this same skin endow our project, thus substantially improving the dialogue between the two languages played.
Integration problems between the two languages were not only abroad. Inside was a religious figure called "the tabernacle virgin" who needed rest in a coherent and contemporary conception. So we had to design an altar that was made with stone material, strong and durable, preferably quarry. And which should maintain a conservative style and ornate. Careful matching between panels, board material and side sills saints was as managed frame and balance the integration of the altar to the rest of the space.
Design: alfa studio Arquitectura Project leader: Jorge Farias Project name: SB Chapel Tipology: Religious Area: 449 m2 Location: Los Reyes, Michoacán, México Estatus: Under Construction Web site: www.alfastudioarquitectura.com Images: Courtesy of Jorge Farias
