Contemporary architecture often employs terms and objects that are adopted from other disciplines: from the way in which projects are presented (media, publicity and art) to the elements of the project itself (objects borrowed from the street, from the world of nautical design, and other extra-disciplinary fields). The presupposition here is that the decontextualisation of these elements is capable of providing an added value, a form of estrangement that increases the identity of a building, or which, through the mechanisms of analogy or irony, confirms the ideas upon which a project is based. This proper use of improper elements may also take place within the discipline itself, as is the case with this addition to an arts centre in Castellón where Santiago Cirugeda has chosen to clad the building with formwork designed for pouring the floor slabs. Here the mechanism is more subtle: the modules in black plastic appear, to those who don’t know any better, like primary objects, realised specifically for the project. Placed together they create a texture, emphasised by the shadows generated by the voids that were originally designed to hold poured concrete.

The identity of the building is reinforced by the serial nature of the elements that define the elevations, installed using steel bars that protrude from the envelope, collaborating in the patterning of the exterior surfaces. The formwork is produced to be mounted horizontally, and for this reason, it clearly presents its nature of being a technological component that is predisposed for serial assembly; the invention here is the way in which the characteristic of being a component is also guaranteed on the vertical surfaces. The redemption of the “object trouvé” is precisely the result of this hidden nature; the plastic modules, normally throwaway items, or destined to remain hidden within the structure, in this case become the most evident element of the project, almost a form of decoration. Their identity remains neutral because no one, unless the floor slab is demolished, will ever be able to understand their aesthetic quality. Their appearance, as intended by the designer, is an accident: we are observing something that we should not see, where form follows a functional and not an aesthetic principle. The paradox of this application lies in the reversible nature of their new use: they are dry laid and used as cladding and, therefore, they are part of a temporary approach that is completely extraneous to the productive process for which they have been created. The polemic position with which these industrially produced modules have been used is evident, as is the compromise that this generates: this approach masks an intolerance towards the type of contemporary architecture that abuses the technological component and the star system which employs considerable budgets and energies to acquire patents and rights to unique materials, that can only be used on a one-off basis.

Santiago Cirugeda is not new to these forms of resistance towards the cultural establishment and the urban environment: the construction systems proposed by his Recetas Urbanas are strident with regards to their context, in some cases bordering on the illegal. They are parasitic schemes that the architect provides to anyone (architects, builders, workmen and inhabitants) who wishes to challenge the “institutional” methods employed in the making of architecture in the city, assuming an attitude of negotiation or even of resistance. This gives his projects a recognisable language: their vocabulary is the result of the necessity of producing temporary and reversible objects.

The addition, built in only 8 weeks, is composed of two principal volumes, (60 and 80 sq m) and two tunnels (30 sq m) which guarantee access to an otherwise unused roof (440 sq m). The classrooms have been designed for cultural activities related to the centre (conferences, teaching and debates). The structure is composed of load bearing steel elements and a secondary system in maple. On the front of the building it rests on the ground, while on the back it connects to the volume of the museum. The interior finishes are in drywall modules, while the exterior cladding is realised in aluminium or maple sandwich panels and PVC sheeting, depending upon the nature of the volumes. At grade, as a demonstration of the original application of the formwork used for the main volumes, a series of floating concrete slabs function as benches. This makes it possible to simultaneously observe the “proper” and the “improper” use of the object, providing an opportunity to evaluate the most correct of these instrumental applications.

Credits

Architect: Santiago Cirugeda
Client: ESPAI, Centre for the Contemporary Arts, Castellón, Spain
Collaborators: Gianluca Stasi, Carlo Magoni, Guillaume Menauix
Special Thanks: Juan de Nieves, Lorenza Barboni