Milán 44, a auto-parts warehouse transformed into vibrant local market by Francisco Pardo Arquitecto.

The project transforms a fourstorey warehouse built in the early 1900’s that was originally home to an auto-parts store into an urban market that reactivates a neighborhood, which connects two entirely contrasting areas.
Designed by Francisco Pardo Arquitecto, at103, in collaboration with architect Julio Amezcua, Milán 44 is an urban-regeneration project located in Colonia Juarez, Mexico City.

On one side, the booming business district that lines the emblematic Paseo de la Reforma, and on the other side, the lively epicenter of hipster subculture, Colonia Roma Norte.

This area, which has been in decay since the 1985 earthquake, is currently experiencing a slow gentrification process. Centrally located and rich in history, it has been equipped with new infrastructure and now holds the genetic code for the city’s future development.
 

Description of the project by Francisco Pardo Arquitecto, at103

Transforming the existing building according to the new dynamics of the area has been the main challenge for the architectural firm, who decided to integrate a regular grid of concrete beams, columns and slabs, originally conceived from a utilitarian perspective, into the poly-dynamic venue’s new public role.

Left exposed like a raw skeleton, the reticular structure is the framework for a two-storey local market, restaurants, and several private commercial spaces including a barber’s shop and a yoga studio. The new public program intrinsically and physically forms an extension of the city itself: the former warehouse with its blind façades vigorously shakes off its skin, opening up and inviting the urban fabric to come in.

While maintaining its original scale and structure, the building has undergone a complete metamorphosis: a green staircase has been added to generate fluid vertical circulation. Acting like a fil-rouge, this element connects the spaces and invites visitors to explore the building extensively.

Through it, the street folds to the inside and upwards” says Francisco Pardo, founder of the architectural practice. “it’s like a vortex that transversely crosses the building, pulling the street right up to the rooftop”.

The architectural peak culminates on the top floor, which is also open to the public and hosts a beer bar: in this way, the Milán 44 project gives back to the city much more than just the ground floor of a standard building, which is typically designated for commercial use. In its place, an entirely fresh, dynamic venue has emerged, in homage to the collectivity that embodies the radical change embracing the area.

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Architects
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Design Team
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Jan Müller, Tiberio Wallentin, Gabriela Mosqueda, Benjamín Mercado, Víctor Cruz, Aarón Rivera
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Real Estate Concept
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ReUrbano. Rodrigo Rivero Borrell Wheatley + Alberto Kritzler Ring
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Restaurant ‘Ojo de Agua’ Design
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Casa Villana
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Location
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Milán 44, Colonia Juárez, Mexico City
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Area
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1.016 sqm
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Dates
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Design.- 2014
Completion.- 2017
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Awards
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2017 Archmarathon Awards Milán.- Milán 44, category Commercial Retail, first prize.
2016 Quito Panamerican Bienale.- Milán 44, category Rehabilitation & Recycling, first prize.
2016 Mexican Architecture Bienale.- Milán 44, silver medal.
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Photography
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Francisco Pardo is an Architect with a Master’s Degree in architecture from Columbia University in New York. He was awarded with the young creators scholarship in 2001 and is a member of the Mexican National Creators System since 2010 by the Arts and Culture Ministry.

In 2016, he founded Francisco Pardo Arquitecto practice in Mexico City. Formerly, in 2000, he founded with Julio Amezcua AT103, an architectural firm where they developed projects on different scales and received several awards.

In 2008, the Ave Fenix Fire station earned them a silver medal in the Mexican Architecture Biennial and the first place in the Best Institutional Building category at the International Design Festival.

In 2009, Pardo was awarded the title, “Emerging Voices” by the Architectural League of New York, the most important recognition for emerging firms that distinguishes new practices in North America. In two consecutive occasions, Pardo received the silver medal for “best housing building” at the Mexican Architecture Biennale and also won the Grand Jury Prize at the Pan American Biennial of Quito, Ecuador.

In 2011, he won the 1st prize in the competition by invitation for the renovation of “Palacio de Lecumberri” a former prison that currently hosts the General Archive of the Nation. Pardo also received the 1st Price in Milan’s 2014 ArchMarathon for Havre 69.

His practice was named by London’s Wallpaper magazine as one of the World’s 50 hottest young architect practices and ranked by Icon magazine of London as one of the 50 design and architecture firms that are shaping the future. His work has been published and exhibited internationally; he has lectured at many institutions in countries such as China, Spain, USA, Italy, Germany, Venezuela, Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Colombia and Mexico - among others.

He’s currently working on the project San Juan Pugibet market in Mexico City, a rural school in Puebla, and social housing and various recycling projects in Mexico.

He has taught architecture in Iberoamericana University, where he coordinated the housing workshop for 4 years. He has been a Master’s Degree visiting professor at UPenn in Philadelphia and UC Berkeley in California, where he was named “Fridman Profesorship” in 2010. Currently he teaches at the Southern California Institute of Architecture in Los Angeles (SciArc), where he coordinates the program SciArc-Mexico.
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Published on: June 27, 2017
Cite: "Milán 44 by Francisco Pardo Arquitecto. From warehouse to multidisciplinary market" METALOCUS. Accessed
<https://www.metalocus.es/en/news/milan-44-francisco-pardo-arquitecto-warehouse-multidisciplinary-market> ISSN 1139-6415
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