Architects: LAND Arquitectos (Cristóbal Valenzuela Haeussler + Ángela Delorenzo Arancibia) Location: Avenida del Valle, Colina, Santiago, Chile Collaborator Architects: Javier Lorenzo, Pablo Andrade Master Plan and Landscaping design: LAND arquitectos + Karl Yunis (Ecology) Project area: 1,300 sqm Project year: 2010 Photographs: LAND Arquitectos
The Master Plan proposal mainly generates a central green core of about 1 HA in which is located the Club House. The landscaping project is based on the concept of reproducing a local ecosystem and re uses the remains from the building diggings effectively to generate mounds with vegetation in certain areas to mitigate noise and views from the parking lots, streets and sports fields that surround this space. So this central green core is a sheltered recreational area for the pool, games for the children, events and any other activity. And at the same time connects all the club facilities.
The Club House project is based on the idea that the Grangonian family comes together in three key areas: -the Players Pub (Irish pub type, games room, dining room, living room, and barbecue), -the pool area, -and the sports facilities area.( Rugby, Hockey, Soccer, and Tennis).
Thus, the project is structured into three levels:
-Level 1: sports changing rooms, swimming pool and other facilities related to the pool and children area. This level is 1.5 meters under the natural terrain level (NTL). Generating a square perimeter, shaded, as a prelude to the dressing rooms and connecting with the green area and pool area directly. -Level 2: Players Pub, which rises 1.5 meters above the NTL. Getting a nearly 360-degree view of the surroundings.
NTL-Level: Between these two levels, is located the Club access, reception and cloakroom.
These levels interact and connect through the perimeter with the outside green core area surrounding the building.
Structurally, the strategy of sinking the first level under the NTL 1.5 meters is based on the assumption that the field contains an expansive clay layer that would have to be removed anyway. Thus, the first level is the concrete foundations on which is mounted the second level of prefabricated laminated wood, covered in the outside with a ventilated skin.
From the conceptual perspective the idea was to recall the club’s identity linked to a British culture (British school Alumni´s club – The Grange School). So, we base our proposal in a topology type, drawn from the construction of some UK towns and villages. As a succession of houses with high ceilings, baseboards stone formations often labyrinthine and complex. Reinterpreting these formal ideas to our climate and contemporary context. Where the successions of houses are used as a succession of spaces designed to obtain certain exterior views willing to strength up the relationships between the internal and external spaces and the integration of the interior program too in a “small town” dynamic.
