Auzo Factory Irazábal-Matiko

Bilbao has a continuous ring of districts that surround the more touristic and mediatic city centre, many with evident necessities for architectural intervention. Matiko is one of them. In this district the city has provided an industrial building to be converted into an entrepreneurship centre, based on a model that uses the recovery of old buildings to revitalize the place where they are located. The most significant aspect of the project was the idea to design a facade that made the whole operation visible, with a minimal cost and maximum expressivity. The proposal is a uniform skin with a large scale that covers the exterior structure to create a taut plane. The material chosen for this facade is commonly used for mechanical installations, but here it is conferred with an aesthetic virtue: galvanized steel raceway pans. Behind this surface the old fascia panels and windows will be replaced with new ones that infill between the structural bays, increasing the amount of day lighting. The budget for the facade material (1 kilometre of pans) is around 10,000 € (28.40€m2), which can be considered strikingly low taking into account the impact of the image achieved by this operation.

Credits

Auzo Factory Irazábal-Matiko

Location
Matiko. Bilbao

Architects:
Suárez Santas Arquitectos. Asier Santas Torres y Luis Suárez Mansilla, Technical Architect: Julián Echevarría

Photography:
Luis Asín Lapique

2014