“Casal de la Juventud” Youth Centre by CrystalZoo
12/05/2014.
[Novelda - Alicante] Spain
metalocus, SARA REBOLLO
metalocus, SARA REBOLLO
Description of project by Crystalzoo
“Casal de la Juventud” arises from the consideration of the recovery of old buildings and their adaptation to contemporary needs.
Past and present, far from being antagonistic elements, become respectful members and fight for the same goal: the active and consistent architecture according its time.
Life makes way through generating a wrapping able to equip the building with new technologies and services, materializing it in an air volume. If we project it in the square, it manages to appropriate the city and enjoy the scenery, being able to introduce it in its common places.
The intervention is materialized on a building that retains its identity, ripping the walls and breaking the old courtyard at the same time, creating dynamic spaces that cross between them, favouring internal areas which invite culture and tranquility, and other to increase opportunities for social exchange.
The program of “Casal de la Juventud”, responds to a social, physical and economic context, therefore, this building would not make sense anywhere else.
Crystalzoo is based on the idea of the office as a forum for debate and multidisciplinary collaboration where different concepts and individual skills combine to enrich the whole. It is considered one of Alicante's 6 best architecture firms and between the best 300 studios in Spain, during four years in a row since 2011. Among our successes, we find the exhibition of Hotel Balneario in Gijón in the MOMA, New York, 2006, 1st Prize at FOPA 2007 for the the Library of San Vicente del Raspeig.
José Luis Campos Rosique (Alicante, 1971), architect by UPV in 1999, 1st Prize for End of Degree Project by Generalitat Valenciana. He won the 1st Prize for the Public Library of San Vicente del Raspeig and the International Competition for the Thalassotherapy Centre in Gijón in 2002. He founded Aranea group in 2003 and was second in three international competitions Europan 7, Luarca 2003 and Europan 8, Sintra 2005 and Ceuta 2005 among others. In late 2005, he published the Journal zombiTour_00. In 2006 he founded Crystalzoo, architecture firm which he actually runs.