An old maritime town, El Cabanyal has seen how the city has grown until being absorbed. This has caused a “logical” conflict between the delicate historical fabric of the neighborhood and the peripheral expansion: there is no solution of continuity, but a collision, and that is where the little one loses. Despite being a neighborhood of the future, thanks to its past, its personality and its proximity to the sea, El Cabanyal must also resolve its relationship with tourism in order to maintain its identity. The challenge of this project lies in overcoming these fractures and striving to get closer to the essence of the neighborhood.
It starts from an unfortunate volume, predetermined at 100% by the current urban planning, and is built over protected facades of some old warehouses. Therefore, in addition to solving the program well, it only remains to focus on listening to the echoes that characterize the neighborhood and recreate it: its dense urban mesh, the verticality of its load-bearing wall facades and narrow plots, the profusion of ornament and crafts of the original facades (glazed ceramics, locksmith, wooden shutters…). Thus, albeit from the superficial, or from the tactile if you prefer, the proposal tries to placate the clash by offering a space for coexistence between the local and the global, which speaks of time and the human, but, above all, in a concrete place.

client : private owner

head architects : marta orts – carlos trullenque

assistant architects : jesús santamans, ana villalba

collaborators : alejandro moreno, pablo muñoz, architecture degree students

renderings : betavisuals