Architects:Garmendia Cordero Arquitectos,TCGA Arquitectos

Area:25000m²

Year:2020

Photographs:Pedro Pegenaute

Lead Architects:Pedro Garmendia, Carlos Garmendia, Álvaro Cordero, Iñaki Tanco, Imanol García de Albéniz, Daniel Azpilicueta

Structure:FS estructuras

Builder:VDR

Technical Architects:Luis Beraza, César García-Fresca

Engineer:EIPA + INARQ

Client:Instituto Politécnico Salesianos Pamplona

City:Sarriguren

Country:Spain

Text description provided by the architects. The project addresses two complicated issues. On one side, it organizes a highly complex program mostly originated by the functional diversity, and on the other, it is an answer to an uncertain and difficult urban context. The new building location is a result to this context. It responds to the needs of the existing city and attends to its future development. Thus, the building complex has been designed to minimize its impact in the consolidated city by fading out when approaching towards it, losing its real scale and generating a soft connection with the Southern city boundary of Sarriguren. A remarkable volume on the North side of the site placed along the East-West axis, protects from the usual cold wind coming from the mountains close to the riverside. At the same time, it turns its back to several service buildings and the dense traffic of the ring road of Pamplona.

The rest of the project buildings grow starting from this volume. Four horizontal blocks oriented from North to South change their size and location according to their use, reaching the city quietly and smoothly. The link between the different volumes is carried out by a void that becomes the main formal and functional axis of the project. A porticoed space connects each building and protects the corridors between them leading into a large arena that, in addition to solving the level differences of the ground, generates an outstanding urban space. A great meeting plaza designed to accommodate all kinds of flows and activities, which also works as a link between the educational and sport areas. Regarding the program, the complex stablishes a division between the educational and administrative areas in the East side, and those destined for sports in the West, thus facilitating the possibility of an independent operation of both elements. A second division has been generated within the educational program, between the public zone and the teaching area. This public area closes the complex in the East side and becomes the new façade of the access point. With the church presiding over the volume in the southeast corner and welcoming visitors approaching from the city, the rest of this horizontal low-rise building house administrative and residential uses and accompanies the students to the entrance, which leads towards the porticoed void court prior to entering any of the buildings.

The northern volume is the highest one and accommodates all the secondary and high school classrooms in the upper levels. This allows for the alternative program such as auditorium, cafeteria, library in the lower levels. The remaining buildings house training areas and workshops. The landscape runs between these volumes from the south of the site reaching the porch area and creating a natural relaxed environment, visible from every spot in the complex. A project that has been organised through a sequence of voids that break, cut and shape the general volume, organizing pedestrian flows, solving the height difference of the site and allowing a new dialogue with the urban context. A design process that bridges the scale differences in order to integrate the new building with the surroundings and generate within it countless diverse spaces that enrich its own use.

El volumen norte, el más alto, alberga la totalidad de las aulas de secundaria y bachiller en sus dos plantas superiores, dejando en su planta baja el programa más alternativo (salón de actos, cafetería, biblioteca,…) mientras que los tres edificios restantes alojan a los talleres de los diferentes grados de formación profesional. Entre estos volúmenes la vegetación avanza desde la parte sur de la parcela, alcanzando la zona de porche y creando así un entorno natural y relajado, visible desde cualquier punto del complejo. Un proyecto que se compone a través de los vacíos que rompen la volumetría general, la recortan y esculpen organizando flujos, salvando la geografía de la parcela y permitiendo que la implantación del conjunto dialogue con su contexto urbanístico. Un proceso de composición que salva las diferencias de escala a fin de integrar el nuevo edificio en su entorno y genera en su interior infinidad de espacios diversos que enriquecen el propio uso del mismo.

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Project location

Address:31621 Sarriguren, Navarra, Spain