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Architects: LAMZ Arquitectura
- Area: 6383 ft²
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Manufacturers: AutoDesk, Chaos Group, GRAPHISOFT, DuPont, Adobe Systems Incorporated, CHOVATEK, Cemex, Fester, Helvex, Lincoln, S.L. LIGHTING, Tecnolite, Trimble Navigation, Tuboplus
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Lead Architect: Luis Alberto Martínez Zuñiga
Text description provided by the architects. The project emerges based on the necessity to consolidate the community of San Pedro Cajonos with a higher silk production within the Sierra Norte in the state of Oaxaca. Due to the topography in the region, the project consists of finding the correct form to settle and emerge each volume and create a pathway for two options: the perpendicular or diagonal angles within the platforms. The purpose of the platforms is to respect the pre-existing trees and generate a series of ramps that have an adequate slope to disperse you from one place to another. Between each platform, we search for the correlation of interior-exterior, marking the landscape and searching for an adequate transition between each space, whose characteristics and temperature vary between one another.
The diagonal solution on the slope gave us interesting functional criteria, generating a triangular grid over the site, one that could either stretch or shrink in the virtue of each function or space, thus originating a series of edges outside and within the design to create tension between each of the different bodies/volumes.
The material selection has two important connotations for the project: the first response directly to a structural function, creating a structural grid that covers wide spaces, generating transparency with light transitions between the volumetric bodies. The second, is the search for better behavior from the material through time, that being of a public building, maintaining low-cost maintenance is important, and as such the aging of the concrete will be able to generate an amalgam between the building and the context.
The pedestrian access, a brick pathway, guides you towards the main door and makes a turn at the end for another ramp, one that takes you to the roof terraces. Inside, the interior circulations permit a fluent transit for the handicapped and elderly in reach of the main spaces that showcase historical artifacts used by ancestors while permitting the overlook of the initial activities of the silkworm cultivation process.
The different rooftops that are connected through bridges and inclined roofs with adequate slopes make a passage through the canopy of the trees within and outside of the project, allowing the visitors to enjoy the great views of the Sierra Norte Mountain range and the surrounding landscape.
