8 examples of the best current Girona architecture: rooted in villages, far from the city model

GironaNew construction single-family homes, renovations and refurbishments in small villages of Empordà, next to the Costa Brava. The majority, second homes for families from Barcelona. In coherence with the surroundings and made with local materials. It would be the most representative example of award-winning architecture currently being produced in the Girona region. This is determined by the projects selected in the latest editions of the Girona Region Architecture Awards, organized by the Girona delegation of the College of Architects of Catalonia (COAC).

In the 28th edition, the proportion of selected houses has decreased, but it remains a very representative sample. One example, in the words of the Girona architect Ramon Bosch, a member of the jury along with Bea Borque from Barcelona and Stephen Borque from London, of "the lack of public works," which means that all current muscle is in the hands of private architects and developers. Despite this, this year's awards, which will be presented on May 29th, at 7:30 PM, at the headquarters of the COAC Girona, show a certain turning point.

the project for the future Girona Health Campusthe project for the future Campus de la Salut de Girona, which includes the new Trueta, which is already under development.

The importance of intermediate spaces

This lack of public works still places Girona far from the radar of award-winning architecture. Of all the selected projects, only one is in the city and it is an ephemeral work from the past edition of Temps de Flors. Regarding new works or renovations, the "symptom of a certain return to the appreciation of native and traditional techniques" remains, in the words of Ramon Bosch, such as the use of the Alicantine shutter. In the case of the jury's selection, there is a "special appreciation for intermediate spaces, galleries, courtyards, and porches, which has to do with the typical Mediterranean culture of enjoyment" and the generation of passive elements to combat the heat.

A large-sized porch with a wooden roof and protected by Alicante blinds, which extends beyond the house to invade the swimming pool, is the great protagonist of this project in Fonolleres by the Finnish-Catalan architect couple formed by Anna and Eugeni Bach. It is the rehabilitation of a house from 2000 based on a central volume, the original, and adding others as appendices around it. An idea inspired by what was common in traditional Catalan farmhouses, as they were constructions that advanced with time. Beyond the blinds, we find traditional elements such as artisanal adobe from Baix Empordà, with an ochre tone that also inspires the entire palette of earthy colors of the house.

If one thing has been highlighted by the jury in the selection of the finalists for this year's Architecture Awards, it is the "contextualization" of the project. A case in point is this house, for a family that after years in Barcelona has returned to the village, to Juià, in the Empordà region of Girona. As the Tarragona-based studio NUA arquitectures, formed by Arnau and Ferran Tiñena and Maria Rius, explains, Mas Nadal is a small, linear urban fabric structured around a single street. This sequence of ordered pieces ends with the presence of a farmhouse, which marks the transition from street to path and serves as an entrance to Les Gavarres.

This house, located right opposite, seeks "dialogue with the surroundings through the loggia of the party walls, preserving the original topography of the site". And at the same time, the project "mirrors the neighboring farmhouse" and, like the house in Fonollera, is organized through different intermediate spaces for cross-ventilation and solar control, also with Alicante blinds. What for NUA arquitectures is the version of a "contemporary farmhouse".

On the edge of the Cap de Creus Natural Park, Casa Balma Murada is an example of a newly built house integrated into the environment with the typical slate from the area, with which thousands of kilometers of dry stone walls are made, and at the same time a minimalist and contemporary interior. The multidisciplinary Barcelona studio Mesura (architecture, interior design, furniture design, urban development, and research) signs this project in which it uses very wide walls to provide climatic protection and thermal inertia at the same time, while the geometry provides natural ventilation. At the same time, the house is designed to withstand the onslaught of the tramuntana wind while offering magnificent views of the Albera mountain range when it reaches Llançà and Colera.

Far from the coast, Can Sargantana is a farmhouse located in the Garrotxa region of Santa Pau, renovated by the Olot architecture studio Bayona Studio. Signed by Xevi Bayona and Cristina Montero, the project presents us with a multifaceted question: how can we inhabit a ruin? Instead of starting from the construction of the spaces to be inhabited, the renovation uses "the void as a motor" and then the house adapts to the existing space. Stone and wood have a great exterior prominence, also in the renovation of the old barn, while, as in the rest of the projects, intermediate spaces are again key. A large porch has been created that serves as a hinge between the interior and the exterior, which is presided over by an old pond recovered and rehabilitated for bathing.

Twenty-three years after being finalists in architecture awards for the renovation of a Primary Care Health Center (CAP), the tandem of architects rooted in Barcelona, formed by Jaume Coll and Judith Leclerc, have once again been selected for Architecture Awards for a similar proposal. In this case, it is no longer the new construction of a CAP, as was the case in the Montilivi neighborhood in Girona, but the expansion of the Moisès Broggi in l'Escala. A demonstration of where public works are heading today: with renovations and expansions of existing heritage. The expansion is conceived as a replica of the existing building, from 2001, more for "an attitude of affection than for heritage criteria." The same modular structure of concrete pillars and toasted brick as the main material is reused, with a whole system of courtyards and ventilation for the space.

Not all are single-family homes in small towns. In Avinyonet de Puigventós, the young architect from Girona, Quim Olea – winner of the prestigious European Europan prize for an urban planning reform in Waalwijk, the Netherlands – is responsible for the rehabilitation of an old warehouse in the historic center to convert it into the Lleva't bakery. Based on the existing structural reading, the project is articulated in a sequence of three areas for the workshop and sales point, the fermentation space, and finally a third room, with independent access, for storage and services under a stone and lime mortar barrel vault. The intervention seeks minimal impact and plays with textures and irregularities, superimposing a new functional and hygienic layer. Wood and tile have weight, but the main objective is that all the prominence goes to the bread-making process and the baker's craft.

Since last October, the Santa Clotilde Gardens in Lloret de Mar have had a new open-air amphitheater with the aim of expanding the cultural offerings in the municipality from this privileged location. It is the work of the Barcelona architecture and landscape design studio scob, formed by Sergi Carulla and Oscar Blasco, who had the challenge of creating a space that would fit into one of the best-preserved Novecento gardens in Catalonia, the work of Rubió i Tudurí. The recipe has been to start from the "principles of simplicity, order, and clarity typical of the movement," thus the stage hanging over the sea becomes a circle surrounded by a sinuous wave. To integrate also in terms of materials, sauló sand is used.

For almost a decade, the seafront of l'Escala has undergone a total transformation by the internationally awarded Barcelona studio OAB. It has been a constant change based on the premise of "work by absence." That is, eliminating elements that "distort the quality of the place to allow the essence of the landscape to become the protagonist again." The promenade is a privileged point from which one can glimpse Cape Norfeu, the Bay of Roses, Canigó, and Sant Martí d'Empúries, as well as closer maritime elements such as the port of en Perris or the Cargol rock. The renovation, also designed for night lighting, takes into account the action of the levant winds so that the water returns to the sea.