112 SOCIAL HOUSING UNITS (PROTECTED) AND PARKING SPACE
Location: PLOT 18.1.2 ENSANCHE SUR SECTION OF ALCORCÓN (MADRID).
Owner: Alcorcón Municipal Land Company (EMGIASA). Alcorcón Town Council, Madrid
Design: José Enrique Fombella Guillem and Francisco Javier Morla Juaristi
Construction supervision: José Enrique Fombella Guillem and Francisco Javier Morla Juaristi
Date: 2007-2009
The Council launched a tender, through its municipal housing company, in an ambitious social building programme as part of the new urban development in the south of Alcorcón. Teams of architects were invited to propose a design for the social housing blocks with Official Protection, as a result of which our team was awarded two contracts. Other contracts were awarded to different architectural practices, thus guaranteeing not only variety in the designs but also a fair share among the best designs presented.
The urban layout was very open, generating a wide variety of architectural approaches, always maintaining high standards of energy efficiency, economy and rationality in terms of typology and construction, which helped to successfully complete an urban development in a very short time. The development has since been acknowledged as a pioneer in bioclimatic design and architectural quality in Madrid.
Two parallel blocks were designed, each 6 storeys high (ground floor + 5), on streets running from north to south. The floor area required was achieved with maximum efficiency, in a minimum volume, leaving space for a large, central, airy and very sunny courtyard for all to use, which improved the bioclimatic conditions of the buildings with the presence of plants and trees.
The focus was on austerity when planning the composition and resources, in order to generate a rational and efficient solution with the minimum components, while producing an eloquent building.
There are two flats and a vertical communication core on each floor, which makes the typologies very spatially economic, allows the rooms to be well oriented and generates cross-ventilation.
Below the ground level are one and a half basement levels of parking space, common space and centralised building services so that energy use can be combined and economically managed in each block.
In this design we used a system of self-supporting brick façade, separated from the structure of the building, which proved to be both very energy efficient and significantly more economical than a conventional façade.