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Architects: SUMA Arquitectura
- Area: 296 m²
- Year: 2021
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Photographs:Jesús Granada
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Manufacturers: Louis Poulsen
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Lead Architects: Elena Orte, Guillermo Sevillano
Text description provided by the architects. Our-Shelves Apartments is a unique building for a cooperative, located in Madrid, in an area with low-density buildings of single-family and collective housing of up to 4 floors in height, mostly built before the entry into force of the General Plan for Urban Planning of Madrid in 1997. It is a complex enclave in terms of its volumetric constraints since the adjacent buildings to the plot have different positions and heights.
The building introduces several strips of landscaped spaces along the perimeter of the new buildings, thus recovering the configuration of the space of the linear city on this plot. The building is a setback to organizing access on Hernández Rubín Street, generating a common private-use area. In the back area, another garden space for private common use is created, so that the building is isolated inside the plot and bordered by landscaped spaces. This proposal organizes the space in such a way that the building is integrated into the concept of the linear city that had been lost.
Management. Departamentos-Our-Shelves is a cooperative housing development for a group of young professionals who wish to acquire their first home, represented by SUMA Architecture. Departamentos Our Shelves is a collective housing project in an open block that contains 8 duplex apartments with 3 bedrooms, staggered rooms, and elevator service on all floors. All the apartments have a private outdoor space, a garden on the ground floor, and a large terrace on the penthouses. In addition, the project offers unique features that allow each cooperative member to customize and receive a tailored design for their home (not just choosing materials). The complex has a swimming pool, garden, and parking.
The building is organized into half-level rooms, which allows each apartment to have 3 different heights. This makes it possible for all apartments to have a garden, with 4 garden apartments and 4 penthouses with a terrace. Being a cooperative, each home is a repository of memory and contains fragments of the cooperative members and their own. It is an investment made to measure each individual (based on individual criteria and decisions regarding quality). The apartments are treated as custom-made suits for the needs of each family, resulting in unique homes. The wooden structure is "socialized" becoming elements of sun protection, control of views and privacy, integrated furniture, etc. The staggered floors improve communication between rooms and visual connections with terraces and gardens, making the apartments a reflection of families' awareness of the sustainable world they live in.
Typological Innovation. As a cooperative, each housing unit is a repository of memories and contains fragments of both the cooperatives and their own. It is an investment made to measure each individual, based on their own criteria and individual decisions regarding quality. The housing units are treated as tailor-made outfits, tailored to the needs of each family, resulting in unique homes. The wooden structure is "socialized" and transformed into elements of sun protection, view control, privacy, integrated furniture, etc. The stepped design of the floors improves communication between rooms and visual connections with terraces and gardens, making the housing units a reflection of the families' awareness of the sustainable world in which they live.
The building envelope reflects both the load-bearing structure and the interior configuration. It is a customizable matrix, where the depth of the horizontal planes forms shelves that allow for control of privacy and lighting in each room. In addition, these shelves can be used as storage spaces thanks to their setback, which can accommodate large wardrobes for clothes and personal items, desks, surfaces for beds and sofas, bookshelves, kitchen counters, and sinks. The dense wooden structure offers advantages in terms of hygrothermal properties and ease of assembly.
The load-bearing structure supports the building envelope. The stepped layout of the housing units creates voids in the floors, which allows the exterior envelope to reflect both the load-bearing structure and the interior configuration. The repetition of these elements generates a dense structure that functions as a prefabricated, easy-to-assemble, dry, and fast assembly system with very little waste generation. The building envelope and structure are the same elements that allow for control of privacy, lighting, and temperature in each room and serve as integrated storage space thanks to its setback. Strategic openings and viewpoints are incorporated into the envelope in the rooms of the housing units. The addition of elements between the planes of the envelope makes it load-bearing and gives it unique characteristics. The structure is mainly divided into four elements: on one hand, the cross-laminated timber cores of the elevator, the structural timber skin and cross-laminated timber slabs, and lastly, the reinforced concrete structure below ground level.
Sustainability is a key aspect of the building design. The building's systems are resolved using an aerothermal system with heat exchange, which ensures hygrothermal comfort and ventilation in the housing units with maximum efficiency. Additionally, a rainwater collection system is utilized to make use of rainwater, as well as thermal solar panels. The cross-laminated timber (CLT and GLT) structure made of red fir and wild pine, and cross-laminated timber slabs with a resistance class of GL24h, visible on the ceilings, offers advantages in terms of sustainability, hygrothermal properties, and ease of assembly.
CLT is a sustainable material not only because it is made from wood, which is a renewable resource, but also because it does not require the burning of fossil fuels during its production. CLT panels are often assembled and cut during their production and are manufactured with specific joints and openings according to the design, making it a type of prefabricated construction. The use of CLT as a load-bearing material allows it to serve as both structure and finish, which reduces labor and construction time. Being prefabricated and easy to assemble, construction of this type of project is quick and dry with very low waste generation.
