Archiprix International 2001
Universidad de Santiago, - Santiago, Chile
Patricio Alberto Zapata Ascencio
Tutors: Arch. Aldo Hidalgo Hermosilla
The truth is revealed in fragments. The city has its own language, revealed through multiple signals not always evident in speech. The project aims to translate this language, communicating the nature of the location in Santiago City, a city full of square blocks. The proposed project varies between 4 and 10 stories, and distinguishes between the different layers that converge at the site, reclassifying them and generating a conceptual mesh that animates the project as the materialization of the pre-existence of space. The study began with an analysis of the site within the urban geometry. Visual cones, originating in the floor plan, generate a particular direction extending through the whole place. This imaginary line, the sightline through the place, runs in a south-north direction. Sunlight, an element that strengthens this linear experience, creates rigid shadow lines on the vertical surfaces. The project defines an area of incidence of direct light, and an area dominated by shade. Corresponding to the established direction, a virtual walkthrough was built, determined by the area from where the sun, in the contrast of light and shade, disappears due to the obstruction of an existing volume. With the accumulation and overlapping of layers, this becomes the starting point of an ongoing view of the sky. From here on, a section plan is proposed along the initial direction, generating a basic segmentation of five stories. The volume is structured by a continuous walkthrough, carrying sightlines, penetrating both horizontal and vertical planes, in search of the urban sky. As the ascent continues, the presence of the sky becomes more pronounced toward the interior of the volume, concluding in a top floor where maximum transparency opens the sky to view. The project accentuates the historical features of the site, conjoining them with the urban landscape.