Commissioned by the city council of Barberà del Vallès, the Barcelona-based H Arquitectes have completed the architecture project of School Gym 704. The School Gym is comprised of prefabricated, prism shaped building with a sloping roof. The programme of the building is defined by the Department of Education of the Generalitat de Catalunya in its “gym-multipurpose room” model for primary schools.
To provide access to the changing rooms and an otudoor running track for the children’s education center, the architect create a sophisticating porch into the design. The search for an industrialized structural system, light and with a low envoided energy material led to the use of wood as the basic material of the structure as well as for the interior building enclosure.
The outer skin is composed by multi-cellular polycarbonate 343-type panels that are fixed on Omega shape galvanized steel battens screwed on the arcades. This transparent skin protects the wood at the same time that allows us to see it.
The building is perceived by the user in different ways, from the access ramp appears almost like a wall or a silhouette, only at night you come to realize its real condition of building. When you turn the corner and have a wider perspective, then you can notice its actual volume, how to access and the complexity of the successive layers of materials that make it up.
School Gym 704 received a special mention within the ‘Green Building’ category at the Archi-Bau Architecture Awards in Munich this January.
Location: Barberà del Vallès, Catalunya. España.
Author: H ARQUITECTES (David Lorente, Josep Ricart, Xavier Ros, Roger Tudó)
Collaborators: Anna Bullich, architect, Blai Cabrero, student, Iñaki de Mendiguchia, technical architect
Year of realization: 2007-08
Surface constructed: 320m2
Budget: 700.000€
Via. Photography by Adrià Goula
