Description

This project description is an excerpt from the longer article “Urban Block Shapers”. For a comparative analysis and further data including accompanying graphs, please see the article “A Turning Point”.

MBM’s Can Folch Housing is located on the western edge of the Bacelona’s urban nucleus. In contrast to the other projects developed in Villa Olímpica that somewhat preserve yet also reinterpret the classical form of the Eixample, this complex as well as the residential complex 138 Villa Olímpica respond creatively to their unique site conditions, allowing the design of the buildings to work in concert with their contexts, as well as enhance the definition of the streetscapes. The Can Folch Housing was redeveloped on the site of the old Folch factory, whose magnificent brick chimney was conserved as a nod to the area’s industrial past. The great 235-meter-long curving building with its concave façade facing the Carles I Park derived its form from the old railway line that used to cut across the streets with a wide sweeping arc. Spanning across the Carrer de Ramon Trias Fargas that leads directly to the waterfront, the building turns into an arcade just above the street, allowing the longer façade to continue virtually uninterrupted. At the same time, this also lends emphasis to the contour of the Carrer de Mouscou, while the north-south orientation of the building provides direct sunlight all day, with views to both the sea and the park. To break the monotony of this continuous façade, the alternate bands of grey bricks and windows are broken regularly by shafts of bay windows.

Overall, the perimeters of the Can Folch Housing block and the surrounding streets are well-defined, interposed with a number of sightlines cutting through into the interior public space and encouraging a higher degree of urban porosity and street-level activity. Along Carrer de la Marina, the six-storey complex is demarcated by a brown brick building perched above a strongly rhythmic arcade with arches that open up to views of the sunken shopping plaza. Intended to be a mixed-use project with parking in the basement, the complex houses 151 units, 90 of which were sold at market rate, and the remaining 60 were social housing.

1

“Housing for a Compact City”, Legacy London, accessed September 28, 2013, http://www.legacy.london.gov.uk/mayor/auu/docs/housing_compact_city.rtf

The units are composed typically of duplexes and three-bedroom apartments of no more than 13 meters in depth. With a total built area of 34,022 square meters on a site of just 9,923 square meters, the project has one of the highest building intensities among the complexes developed in the urban nucleus with nearly 70 percent given over to residential purposes, 25 percent for parking, and the remaining five percent for commercial use.

2

Martorell et al., La Villa Olímpica, Barcelona 92, 133.

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Originally published in: Peter G. Rowe, Har Ye Kan, Urban Intensities: Contemporary Housing Types and Territories, Birkhäuser, 2014.