Their proposal for the creation of baths using only water and concrete have made this team of students from the University of Valencia the winners of the competition. A timeless space that integrates and respects the privileged environment while creating a unique experience for visitors.
'The project resolves in a convincing and a precise way the dialectical relation between the artificial and the natural, at the same time that proposes a great functional and constructive clarity. With minimal resources it manages to create a diversity of atmospheres of great spatial richness, susceptible of producing the emotion. Its simplicity gives it the sobriety and elegance that fits perfectly in an environment of such strong character. The proposal also has a valuable timeless component', in words of the jury.
Description of the project by the winners
Lagoa Comprida’s glacial erosional landscape has remained since its origins in a high point of Serra da Estrela, a place that has been only drawn by its rocks and water. No human activity far from the dam has ever taken place among its valleys, and a hickers path is currently the only way to get in direct contact with its nature.
The baths proposal embrace that nature, using only its water and concrete -no longer than men tamed rock. It is a minimum presence volume emerging from the rocks, between the original path and the lakeside, where light joins materials to shape its interiors.
The proposal gets divided in two by the approaching path, a point that performs the transition from landscape to human scale. Then appears at one side dry stays for resting after enjoying the other side: the baths; a descending enclosed space only penetrated by light, that offers an aperture on its lowest point, with a subtle separation from the rocks where it was born. A point that makes the visitor understanding the lake, creating a direct inside- outside relation when it offers one of its walls to create an unique outside pool diffused with boulders.
CREDITS.-
Winners.- First prize.- Álvaro Olivares Peralta, Sevak Asatrián, Esther Sanchis Llopis, Eduardo Sancho Calzada (Spain).
Jury.- Fran Silvestre (Spain, Fran Silvestre Arquitectos), Marc Jay (Denmark, WE architecture) and Mauro Turin (Argentina / Switzerland, Mauro Turin Architectes).
Location.- Serra da Estrela, Portugal.
Dates.- June 24, 2015 - October 30, 2015.
