Titlted ‘Memory Box,’ Tuñön y Albornoz’s proposal has landed first prize in the competition to turn the building located at Calle Argumoso 41 in Madrid, close to the Reina Sofía Museum, into the Exhibition Center for Democratic Memory, a space devoted to imparting knowledge and promoting reflection on historical memory. Other entries were given recognition: ‘Eje embajadores,’ by Frade Arquitectos (first runner-up), and ‘Memoriae,’ by the team comprising Arias Garrido Arquitectos, Baile Menduiña, and S. Mata Arquitectura.

The winning project involves a respectful intervention on heritage, inserting a new volume – the ‘memory box’ – within the existing Neo-Mudejar construction and preserving its original walls. Built with a kind of brick resembling that of the existing pieces, it will superpose three large halls with similar spatial attributes but different lighting solutions, adaptable to the facility’s exhibition requirements.

Grounded on the concepts of flexibility, energy efficiency, and heritage integration, the scheme accepts the original building’s dual character, with a grander facade on Calle Argumoso and a more discreet, industrial one facing Calle Hospital. The intervention engages in dialogue with this duality, respecting symmetries on Argumoso while presenting a strongly horizontal terraced elevation towards Hospital, creating the conditions for light to shine in. The volume is set back to maximize the breadth of the courtyard, in line with the other buildings, and distance it from the neighbording corridor house.

A property of the Treasury Ministry, the 1860 building has served various purposes through the years – from a rehearsal venue for the Teatro de la Zarzuela to a ministerial archive – and now begins a new life as a space for democratic memory.