Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco
30/11/2018.
[Cardedeu - BCN] Spain
metalocus, INÉS LALUETA
metalocus, INÉS LALUETA
Real Estate Boom House is a project by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. A project to remodel a house (that of his parents Jaume and Maria Luisa) as a result of the real estate boom of the late nineties (and the beginning of the 21st century, surprising as even the dates of the crisis have already been forgotten), Cardedeu, 45 km from Barcelona.
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco.
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco.
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Heviaouse por Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Fotografía por José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Heviase por Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Fotografía por José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco. Photograph by José Hevia
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco.
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco.
Real Estate Boom House by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco.
With this project Lluís Alexandre tries to analyze why this house can be considered the aesthetic paradigm of an era, contrasting and questioning the different domesticities that take place in it through the following strategies:
First, the house’s original design, materials and construction details reveal the imaginaries of opulence that drove part of real-estate-boom design in Spain: the staircase of the house is located inside a crenel-crowned tower with lancet arch windows; the entrance verandah is supported by prefabricated, casted Doric columns; the hall and the staircase are covered in mass-produced Andalusian tiling.
Second, the privileged views over the old town from the house’s back façade, at the edge of a suburban area and cow fields, are under continuous threat: once the country experiences an economic recovery, the fields will probably be urbanized.
And third, the house’s domestic interior attests to the radically different generational sensitivities that have constituted the boom. In the interior of Bellavista 21, large amounts of traditional, Castilian craftwork produced by Maria Luisa, which recall the rural origins of the family, are placed alongside signature design objects acquired per the suggestion of Maria and Jaume’s sons.
The intervention attempts to highlight these three conditions through a single operation. The staircase was archaeologically restored using old Castilian craft techniques mixed with new technologies that highlight the original materials and details. As if they were ruins, these boom remnants are filled with plants to serve as a substitute to the house’s endangered back views of the fields, soon to disappear.
More information
Authors
Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco with Laura Migueláñez, Mireia Gallego
Interior gardening
Alvaro Carrillo and Paula Currás
Client
Jaume Casanovas, María Luisa Blanco Estébanez
Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco
Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco, (1986) is a New York and Barcelona based architect, curator and scholar. He was the chief curator of the Oslo Architecture Triennale 2016 together with the After Belonging Agency, and he is currently a PhD Candidate at Princeton University, and a Critical Studies Helena Rubinstein Fellow 2017-18 at the Whitney ISP.
Casanovas was trained as an architect at ETSABarcelona and the Edinburgh College of Art, and graduated from the MSc in Advanced Architectural Design at Columbia Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation.
His writings have appeared in several publications such as Volume, ARPA Journal or Plot. Casanovas is recipient of several grants such as the La Caixa Fellowship for Postgraduate Studies, or the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts Grant. He has collaborated with different design offices and research institutions as the Buell Center or the GSAPP Global Africa Lab, and has taught studios at Barnard College, Princeton University, and ETSA Barcelona, and has lectured in different venues such as ZKM Karlsruhe or the University of Sydney.
Casanovas was trained as an architect at ETSABarcelona and the Edinburgh College of Art, and graduated from the MSc in Advanced Architectural Design at Columbia Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation.
His writings have appeared in several publications such as Volume, ARPA Journal or Plot. Casanovas is recipient of several grants such as the La Caixa Fellowship for Postgraduate Studies, or the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts Grant. He has collaborated with different design offices and research institutions as the Buell Center or the GSAPP Global Africa Lab, and has taught studios at Barnard College, Princeton University, and ETSA Barcelona, and has lectured in different venues such as ZKM Karlsruhe or the University of Sydney.
