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Architects: Otxotorena Arquitectos
- Year: 2011
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Photographs:Jose Manuel Cutillas
Text description provided by the architects. The built complex is located in plot EP-13 of the ‘Ecocity’ of Sarriguren. It is destined to become the new Town hall of the Valley. It meets to a fairly articulated and complex and very detailed programme of requirements, for which a detailed description of the planned uses and distribution by storeys was provided.
The ground floor had to house the Mayors office and dependencies, a Political Area and another for Cultural Centre, as well as the General Services Area. On the second floor and attic the Municipal Legal Assessment, Intervention and Property Register, and Urbanism and Works Services are located, as well as the Justice of Peace. On the ground floor, besides the general access and common areas of the hall, Citizen Advice Point, General Register and notice board, the Social Services and the Municipal Police areas are located, with independent access. Two basements include, in addition, a car park for 30 vehicles, an extensive Historical Records Room and various areas for installations, changing rooms and storage.
The design of the building attempts to rigorously meet the ambitious programme of requirements established and the representative and institutional use of the building, associated with the subsequent requirements for image, starting from the absolutely privileged nature of its conception. The development of these arguments leads to deciding on the layout of the areas of the building around an inside patio, whose dimensions are a consequence of the maximum alignments of the plot. A part of this patio is deeper and attempts to include more natural lighting and ventilation to the first basement.
The geometrical structure of the three above ground floors is established in accordance with a sequential logic that relates them in height; it assigns a structure of ‘L’ to the ground floor, which finds its counterpoint in the reverse scheme, also in the shape of an ‘L’, which corresponds to the highest storey. The building, in short, it laid out according the superposition of the two ‘L’ structures inverted in certain meeting points where the main elements and facilities for vertical communication are located.
A system of accesses is defined associated to a diagramme of organisation of areas and corridors resulting from the variety and complexity of the uses. This system of accesses is related with wide archways able to give shape to the transition between the park and the administration area of the building. The building undertakes the starring role of the frontispiece so to speak on the outside area of its East facade, characterised as public square. The Mayor's office area is located there and the typical balcony is also projected, going almost from side to side of the elevation.
The construction used in the make up of the volume is that of concrete facing with the counterpoint of aluminium elements in flat and perforated cladding and different slating systems.
