Urban planning and housing in Bordeaux by Mateo Arquitectura

The project is located in Bordeaux in France, it is a urban planning and a block of flats with a garden courtyard in the center that provides lighting and views.

Made by Mateo arquitectura, located next to a port, it is composed of three volumes arranged on a platform of only two floors, one of them bright, a tower with two metal facades and two of wood and another of concrete that delimits the enclosure.

Description of the project by Mateo arquitectura

In the Garonne river port, Bassins à flot, Bordeaux. As though washed up here by nearby waters, rises the hulk of the World War II submarine base. Beside us, other remains of the shipwreck: some small constructions that have to be integrated into the project.

The water table is very high. We cannot excavate to build car parks. We build two storeys right across the plot, introducing the car parks at the centre and arranging dwellings around them, with services along the front. In this case, the floor is porticoed, drawing the perspective from the street towards the old submarine base.

Three volumes are arranged on this platform. Is very low (2 floors), and metal. A small, shiny animal that accompanies the existing dwellings. At the corner, a small tower with four façades. Two metal faces, two timber faces. A concrete-walled block that follows the limits of the plot and defines the urban from towards its sides. The centre is an open, communal garden, offering views and sunlight to the dwellings behind.

The whole, seen from the old port, is mobile and rather jaunty. Like the old ships that are beached there, waiting to be broken up.

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More information

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Architects

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Josep Lluís Mateo - mateoarquitectura

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Client

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Kaufman & Broad

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Collaborators

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Project leader.- Laurent Baudelot
Project team.- Till von Mackensen, Blanca Lora-Tamayo, Èlia Canadell, Maria Güell, Sara Dordas, Àlex Vilar, Marta Gual, Anna Profitós, Lu Xiao, José G. Perpiñá, Frédéric Géraud, Mireia Luzárraga
Site management.- Xavier Monclús

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Area

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30000 m² of urban planning and 10000 m² of housing block

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Competition

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2010 (First prize, invited competition)

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Dates

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Project: 2010-2011
Construction: 2012-2016

JOSEP LLUÍS MATEO

Josep Lluís Mateo was born in Barcelona (1949) and graduated in Architecture in 1974 from the ETSAB and gained his doctorate (cum laude) at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia in 1994.

Mateo’s practice is based in Barcelona, and he is currently involved in a number of local and international projects such as the new Film Theatre of Catalonia in Barcelona, the new headquarters for PGGM Pension Fund Company in Zeist, Holland and the office building on the former site of Renault factories in Boulogne-Billancourt, Paris, among others.

With each of his projects, Mateo seeks to connect the practice of construction with research and development in both intellectual and programmatic terms. He works in the area between the sphere of ideas and the physical world of reality.

Academic collaborations and teaching:
Josep Lluís Mateo has been Professor of the Architecture Department at the Swiss Federal Polytechnic in Zurich (ETH-Z) since 2002. He has also taught and lectured at numerous institutions around the world, including Princeton, Columbia University in New York, the Harvard Graduate School of Design, ABK Stuttgart, UP8 Paris, OAF Oslo and ITESM Mexico. He was Visiting Scholar at the Jean P. Getty Center in Los Angeles from 1991 to 1992. Josep Lluís Mateo is President since 2009 of the Board of Directors of the Barcelona Institute of Architecture. He has been a member of a number of juries and expert committees, including the Quality Committee of Barcelona City Council (2000-2008), and for prizes such as the European Landscape Award and the Thyssen Award.

Recent exhibitions and prizes:
The practice’s work has been exhibited on numerous occasions thanks to its international influence. New York’s MoMA devoted a space in the exhibition “Spain: On Site” (2006) to its apartment building in Valencia for the Sociopolis Project. Individual exhibitions include those at Ras Gallery (Barcelona, 2009), Architekturgalerie Aedes (Berlin, 2004), Architekturzentrum Wien (Vienna, 1998), Col•legi d’Arquitectes de Catalunya (Barcelona, 1998),Galerie Fragner (Prague, 1998), Galerie Aedes (Berlin, 1994), Architekturgalerie Luzern (Luzern, 1992) and Architekturgalerie Munich (Munich, 1991).

The work of Josep Lluís Mateo has been awarded many prizes, including:
- Top International Purpose-Built Venue 2008, First Prize. Best International Convention Centre category.
Organized by C&IT magazine, London. Project: CCIB-Barcelona International Convention Centre
- 2008 Archizinc Award, First Prize. Collective Housing category. Project: Sant Jordi Students’ Hall of Residence, Barcelona
- European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture - Mies van der Rohe Award 2005, Runner-up. Project: CCIB- Barcelona International Convention Centre
- 15th Award of Grupo Dragados de Arquitectura.