The racks are a ‘dug-out’ construction within the store, coated with sprayed mortar, with an irregular, highly rough finish: they are the rocks; the floor is a continuous blue, long-pile carpet, that draws waves and different shades of blue under the footsteps of customers: it is the water; and above, in the double-height space, some panels with a volumetric finish reflect the blue color of the carpet (the water in motion) and the colors of the clothes: it is the sky.

The whole is like putting a small cove from Cadaqués into this space. And the central piece of furniture is something like a fisherman’s boat anchored in the middle. Even the fitting rooms, finished in a stuccoed turquoise paint, with a carpet of the same color, can be seen as caves in the sea, where new colors and textures appear.

These three elements, racks, carpet, and ceiling, actually solve a small but very uneven space, with numerous pillars, lowered beams, or irregularities, thus creating a space with a very marked and regular geometry, arranged along a symmetry axis with the entrance.
Finally, the solution of the double-height metallic ceiling, with frames drawing a grid on all its faces, is a direct reference and homage to the American Bar by Adolf Loos, a masterpiece of interior design.

Text provided by the architect.

The construction process, slow and complex, at least allowed decisions to be made as the essence of the property was revealed with the demolitions. Thus, once all the slabs had been demolished and the building was seen as a slender and tall prism formed by walls with a completely heterogeneous composition of all types of bricks and stones arranged without apparent order or composition, the idea of ​​leaving all these walls seen became conceptual: these four walls, more than 15m high, are a museum of the history of the building, where any trace of construction (arches, lintels, gaps in the steps and beams), and use (remnants of mortars) , furniture, subframes or coverings) will be left unaltered, exposed in all its rawness.

The new slabs (3 in total) will be sheets held by new beams between the party walls, which will not touch either of the two facades: towards the main facade, a sheet of glass will separate them from it; and towards the interior façade, the stairwell will be a 4-storey void that unites the entire interior and shows the surprising height of such a slender building.

The steps of the facilities, by ruling out from the beginning regattas on the walls or small skateboards, take on a special and relevant role in the interior: 7 stainless steel cylinders run the entire height of the building carrying all the electrical installations inside, ventilation, plumbing, extraction, sanitation, air conditioning and telecommunications in 6 of the cylinders, leaving one space for future needs.

These cylinders are not hidden and travel through the building, passing through furniture and flooring. The rest of the installations are always visible, never built-in, highlighting the roughness of the masonry walls on which they are located, freeing them from new constraints.

Materially, a certain refinement has been pursued in the new elements to be implemented, in opposition to the crude expressiveness of the existing walls, aware that the space must house a home. Thus, the kitchen is a piece of frosted brass furniture, shiny and reflective, with a white marble top; The bathroom equipment is paneled with lacquered wood in a slightly cream color, with black and brass details; the ‘headers’ of the plants are covered in white microcement; The hydraulic mosaic, microcement and oak floors add warmth and color to the interior; and the white lacquered wood ceilings incorporate registers and grilles to ‘design’ these needs.

The structure is all painted white, wanting to seek a certain material abstraction, especially in the development of the staircase, with a helical layout, which develops as a free-standing cylinder that runs the entire height of the building without ever touching its walls, offering Piranesian views helped by the heterogeneity of the walls and the diversity of the points of view. On the contrary, all the details on the existing walls are direct and raw: the window frames are made with direct mortar, the pre-frames are not disguised, and the structural tying elements are left unpolished.

Above, in the tower’s forging, a skylight introduces a beautiful gradation of light to the lowest strata; Towards the façade, the glass sheets bounce the lighting between floors and introduce ever-changing reflections, allowing the façade to be admired in all its height from the inside, just as happens in the void of the staircase. The main façade was rehabilitated following the strict dictates of the heritage department, returning it to an image of the past that it surely never had.

Only at the entrance door were we free to invent a front that reproduces the three-dimensional design of the classic hydraulic mosaic (used on the ground floor and very loved by the client) with a layout of rhombuses and triangles finished with 3 types of aluminum, which conceals the door (only recognizable by the lock) and abstracts the entrance.

Text provided by the architect.