Headquarters of Neuron Bio by Antonio Cayuelas

Description of project by Cayuelas Arquitectos

Location

The project for Neuron Bio new headquarters, a biomedical, pharmacological and technological research Enterprise, is placed in a growth area of the city called “Campus de las Ciencias” (Health Sciences Campus) in Granada, in the south of the city, beside the highway. The plot is located in an old field of “Vega” (the orchard near the town) with a smooth topography near a river called “Monachil”. It is an inner piece of land result of subdivides a big plot in four smaller. The main frontage, with north facing, opens to Avicena Street and Monachil River and the south one looks to a public pedestrian space that will be built in the near future.

Building’s design it’s strongly conditioned by urban laws which force relationship between close buildings by lateral setback in proportion with building’s height, causing terracing in ziggurat’s shape.

General description

The project is conceived as a set of overlapping boxes which shelter each unity of laboratories and other program defined uses. These boxes adapt their position to the resulting shape of the existing regulation laws, which, as has been mentioned, demand a lateral setting back. This point, the vertical overlapping, works in order to adapt the building volume to the floor-plot and to the main face, the one in front of Avicena Street.

In the north frontage, a large vertical conduit for facilities and their connections is generated, closed with folding galvanized steel slats; this conduit crosses the nine floors, five of them above the ground and four underground. The facilities area expands in the third floor from the north to the south face, where a two  floored piece is generated, where equipment and large facilities are housed. Beside de north vertical conduit of galvanized steel slats, a double height box is located, housing the manufacturing plant. Due to the technical complexity of the working methods facilities design, these have been carefully studied for its full accessibility and maintenance.

In addition, in order to improve the natural illumination of the inner spaces and boxes, a central courtyard is placed for organizing communication areas, day-light and crossed looks between the different work levels: every working area and laboratory have daylight illumination at least from two positions. Two lifts are placed in the south and north sides of courtyard, one of them is a hoist; the courtyard is used also for vertical facilities maintenance. Enclosing the lifts, strong concrete walls have been built to solve the seismic problem of Granada. Finally, the main stair connects every floor-plan, moving and adapting itself to the lateral shape of the building, with the setting back in the boxes caused by de urban laws.

The color-use plays a double role: on one hand, the color identifies the different kind of laboratories and program areas, giving them a conceptual visibility; on the other hand, it gives optimism to the building image, necessary for investigation development. Color is associated to the contents of each box, which are built with colored glass and fiber-reinforced-cement sheeting.