IMPIVA Headquarters
1991 Jaume Bach with Gabriel Mora
1991 Jaume Bach with Gabriel Mora
address
Parque tecnológico de Valencia, parcelas 77, 78, 79.
Valencia
Spain
Valencia
Spain
client
Generalitat Valenciana
collaborators
Brufau, Obiol, Moya i Associats (structure), Miquel Fibla (quantity surveyor), Ingeniería New System (mechanical engineering).
photos
Lluis Casals
description
The vogue for so-called technology parks, “garden cities” of various artefacts, and the exercise of designing new headquarters for the Generalitat Valenciana´s IMPIVA (fomenting small and medium businesses) made it possible to propose a building with a considerable degree of autonomy, while at the same time exploring the capacity of the form to adapt to the climatic conditions.
The scheme proposes a circular-plan building with a central space, also circular, which seeks to embody the functions of the Mediterranean courtyard. Nevertheless, the circle is widened eccentrically on each successive floor, maintaining a single point of tangent with the floor below, similar in effect, to an inverted version of the well-known table designed by Terragni. The result is thus a dynamic form which affords improved solar protection, and which, in being raised up on “pilotis” –providing a shaded car park and adaptation to the sloping terrain- facilitates the movement of air through the central courtyard, thus serving to minimize use of the air-conditioning system.
The scheme proposes a circular-plan building with a central space, also circular, which seeks to embody the functions of the Mediterranean courtyard. Nevertheless, the circle is widened eccentrically on each successive floor, maintaining a single point of tangent with the floor below, similar in effect, to an inverted version of the well-known table designed by Terragni. The result is thus a dynamic form which affords improved solar protection, and which, in being raised up on “pilotis” –providing a shaded car park and adaptation to the sloping terrain- facilitates the movement of air through the central courtyard, thus serving to minimize use of the air-conditioning system.