Warehouse integrated into the urban fabric | Rehabilitation · Built · 2019
Location: Solivella, Tarragona
This project stems from the client’s need to build a space of approximately 150 m² to store agricultural machinery. To achieve this, the client acquired the plot adjacent to their current home. The plot contained a vegetable garden and a two-storey house from 1880, built using the traditional dry-stone technique typical of the region. One option would have been to completely demolish the existing building and construct a new warehouse using prefabricated materials, but we chose to highlight and preserve the stone construction as much as possible.
The aim of the project, therefore, is the industrialised construction of a warehouse that can coexist with the dry-stone envelope of the former house and with the client’s home, aiming to present the whole as a unified composition. The intervention consisted in demolishing the interior of the stone house, preserving three of its façades, which were cut at the top to adapt to the new height of the warehouse. The existing openings were retained and integrated into the new structure, and new ones were added to allow natural light and ventilation. The façade line was completed, an access for machinery was created between the two buildings, and prefabricated materials were used for the structure and roof. The external finishes were treated with a holistic view of the ensemble, preserving the dry stone and complementing it with the colour tones of the owner’s house. The use of both techniques reduces the building’s scale and integrates it into the urban context.
