Restoration of a Patio
”This complex programme involved reorganising a 6 x 5 metre courtyard in a house in the old town centre of Olot, thereby recovering the courtyard and inserting a skylight in the ceiling of the ground floor, along with a sauna, utility room and studio. The intervention is based on the premise of freeing the facade of existing volumes and relocating the new construction at the rear of the plot in order to produce an empty space between the old and the new buildings, like an indoor space without a roof. The studio is raised so as not to occupy the courtyard, and the sauna is situated beneath the porch. The studio is treated like a typical porch on the rooftops of Olot, with a sloping iron roof and an abstract plane of glass that reflects and organises its surroundings. The work took shape slowly, exposing to view the rough texture of the volcanic rock in the existing facade, the chaotic context of volumes, chimneys, tanks and roofs that, in contrast with the extreme purity and flatness of the glass, created a dialogue between the architectures of different periods, a reciprocal and mutually enriching dialogue.”
