The team formed by Atxu Amann, Andrés Cánovas, and Nicolás Maruri (Temperaturas Extremas Arquitectos) is the winner of the competition for the privilege of building Spain’s pavilion at the Universal Exhibition of 2020, to be held in Dubai. The winning motto, ‘People and Places,’ efficiently captures the spirit of a proposal where participation and sustainability are the leitmotivs, and that organizes the 6,000 square meters of the program by means of a large plaza covered with a cluster of light conical vaults which, serving as thermal chimneys, make it possible to shade and ventilate the interior spaces naturally, while giving the complex a clearly recognizable appearance. Inspired in the local tradition of ‘wind towers,’ this structure of vaults clad with different materials also addresses the principles of the ‘circular economy,’ and is thought out with a view to reusing the pavilion, whether all of it or parts of it, after the Expo.

The jury included the architects Elisa Valero, Carlos Puente, and Fermín Vázquez, and was chaired by Iban García del Blanco, General Commissioner of the Spanish Pavilion.