area 112 | beauty of built

architect: dooa arquitecturas

location: Alicante, Spain

year: 2009

Do you remember those unforgettable moments playing with your friends at school in the courtyard? It is exactly there, in the funniest place of the school, where it is necessary to build the new canteen. The project tries to minimize the loss of playground surface, becoming an extension of the children area, able to interact with them. A big wall that encloses the canteen and separates it from the classrooms becomes a huge blackboard where the children can draw. The existing trees have been preserved and they seem to penetrate into the building with the only impediment of a glass wall that allows children to have lunch almost in contact with the vegetation. A garden of autochthonous fragrant plants in which both trees were transplanted as they interfered with the new construction it sifts encounter between the court of service and the access to the school. The “telemagenta” skin of Aluminium expanded mesh turns into the fence of the ancient school, being canteen, court, kitchen and fence at the same time, turning it into the integration element of both the old and the new buildings where they fuse together. His strong personality provides to the set of identity, making it possible that with the passing of the years, when the children have grown up and will left the school, this school canteen will remain in their memory as a pleasing recollection of their infancy. And why that color? Maybe the color is a reminiscence of the famous pink salt lakes in Torrevieja, the city where the school is, or maybe just because we “felt” it that way.

dooa arquitecturas is a young architectural office that begins in 2006. Our professional merits:
– Accesit in the Contest of Ideas of the Municipal Patronage of the Housing of Alicante, San Antón's Neighborhood.
– Finalist in the 6th National Contest of Ideas of the Community of Madrid for a day center in Fuencarral (Madrid).
– First prize in the contest for the construction of a canteen-kitchen in Virgen del Carmen School, Torrevieja, Alicante (Menjarosa)
– Menjarosa Build catalogued by the Foundation Architects’ bank between the 128 best accomplishments of young Spanish architects corresponding to the period 2008-2009.
– Finalist in the Contest of ideas for the extension of the headquarters of the Architects’ Territorial College of Alicante, Alicante.
– Third prize in the Contest of ideas for the streets Solidaridad and Virgen de Fátima intersection of Águilas, Murcia.
– Casajijona, buid Selected for the Sample of Architecture of the Architects’ Territorial College of Alicante 2006/2007.
– Casajijona Build catalogued by the Foundation Architects’ bank between the 128 best accomplishments of young Spanish architects corresponding to the period 2008-2009
– Accesit in the Contest of ideas for Pedro Gea square of Garrucha, Almería.
– Accesit (second prize ex--aequo) in the Contest draft for the construction of a kindergarden school in Altea, Alicante.
– Second position in the contest for the rehabilitation and extension of R.T. Samper school in Altet (Alicante)
– Finalist in the International Contest of Ideas for the construction of the headquarters of “Casa del Mediterráneo”, Alicante.