Luis Fernández-Galiano   The mythical Pillars of Hercules marked the limit of the known world – non terrae plus ultra – and their hypothetical identification with the Rock of Gibraltar and Mount Hacho in Ceuta established the oceanic threshold of the Mediterranean, leading t

Francesco Dal Co   With its tectonic tone and contextual tuning, the architecture of Ángela García de Paredes and Ignacio García Pedrosa has a voice of its own in the contemporary panorama. However, their work cannot be understood without its background: that of modern

Richard Ingersoll   The ancient Greek myth of the lost continent of Atlantis, which allegedly sank into the depths of the Atlantic Ocean, giving it its name, has for two millennia offered an alternative narrative to Western civilization. Here an imaginary parallel cultu

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   Located on the border of the Madrid region, Valdemaqueda is immersed amid pine groves on a hillside facing south. The road crosses the municipality of dispersed houses, and on the town square – formerly just a widened stretch of the road – stands Tow

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   The Olympia Theater is a vertex on Lavapiés square. Leaning on party walls, the concrete volumes into which it is fragmented adapt to the site’s triangular geometry and retract from the square, enlarging it. The glazed facades are transparent towards

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   The new Congress Center rounds off the cultural program of the Auditorium of Murcia, whose bold triangular form did not admit extensions. However, the mild climate as well as the character of the site, a green area on the city outskirts, let both bui

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   Founded as cultural institution in 1933, the Archaeological Museum has changed site and name on several occasions in the course of the past century. Its final location in what used to be the Colegio Menor Santa María del Mar was followed by several e

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   In the project designed to protect the archaeological site of La Olmeda, ancient times coexist with modernity and architecture is set in contrast with the landscape. These concepts wish to make visitors aware of the unitary character that these fragm

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   In the southern part of the urban center, in a sea of new and plain semi-detached houses without views, the small library had to assert its public presence. The building takes up practically the whole site, and the access is turned towards the Plaza,

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   The seafront location of the site by the Castle of Peñíscola determined both the design and the purpose of this cultural building. The premise was the desire to link all the interior spaces to the park and the sea, so the building displays a continuo

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   The project assesses the character that a housing scheme of this kind must have, and how it must relate to the urban landscape, to the park, and to the roads around it. The task is not just to comply with social housing requirements, but also to stud

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   The 18th century farmhouse was the only building in a landscape of vineyards and olive groves, and it had to be adapted to accommodate a center devoted to wine culture. The farmhouse is thus extended with a new volume with a four-point star shape. Th

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   The historic building dates from 1884, but was extended gradually in the 1920s and 1970s until Rafael Moneo ‘wrapped up’ the block in 2006. Paredes Pedrosa have intervened several times since 1986, when they converted the Cibeles corner into an exhib

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   The site’s complexity – with a fragment of the Andalusian medieval Ceuta –, the compressed character of the current city, and the marked topography encouraged to think of a unifying proposal that could make both aspects coexist. With this integrating

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   The complex features of the site – with a fragment of the medieval Marinid city –, the compactness of Ceuta, and the deep slope called for a proposal with a unifying character. The architecture is born from the place, offering one reading in spite of

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   THE SIX large mulberry trees that rise in the Ausiàs March Park determined the design of this building of innovative program. The UPI (Universidad Popular Infantil, or children’s university), in Gandía, takes up a trapezoidal plot located on the sout

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   Winner in a competition held in the year 2008, the project for the new auditorium of Lugo, a representative building south of the historic center of the city and very close to the River Miño, is set forth as an urban facade, a mirador onto Magoi aven

Paredes Pedrosa Arquitectos   Spain   The location is a plot that was originally occupied by three small dwellings embedded in the old wall of the castle of Oropesa, a town in the central Spanish province of Toledo, and serving as a nexus between the castle and the Church of Our Lady of

Luis Fernández-Galiano   There are lone careers and choral biographies. Ángela García de Paredes and Ignacio García Pedrosa have the latter, not only because they are married to each other and work together, but also because of their ten years of training in the practice of

Luis Fernández-Galiano   Can we again raise walls (paredes) in Pedrosa? The Roman villa of La Olmeda was built in the 4th century in what now is the village of Pedrosa de la Vega, suffered the ruin of its walls after a fire two centuries later, and remained buried until its