DESCRIPTION

The existing dwelling forms part of the residential group known as “el Frare Negre” (1935-53), which includes several monumental buildings and the Maluquer Gardens between Plaza Kennedy and Passeig San Gervasi in Barcelona. All the buildings in the complex have the same formal characteristics on the façade, while there are slight variations in the ground plan as the development was built. The architect of the complex was Eusebi Bona i Puig (1890-1972), and they are currently protected as part of the Barcelona Architectural Heritage Catalogue with protection level C.

The house is distributed around a central hall, in two clear zones: the day area with the kitchen, dining room and living room, and the night area, with bathrooms and bedrooms. The proposed intervention responds to this previous distribution, sharpening the zonal separation. The characteristics of the site produce a very elongated floor plan, 26m, which we wanted to interrupt spatially but maintain the transversal vision of the dwelling. This is why the main entrance hall has a different aesthetic solution to the rest of the house.

The project’s strategy consisted of freeing up the central space, moving the bathrooms to positions closer to the bedrooms in order to provide the central element for a new entrance hall that would clearly connect with the office and act as a transition between the more private spaces of the home. In order to carry out this project, it was necessary to widen the opening between the entrance hall and the office, so that the hall would gain depth and access to the office would be dignified.

The great challenge was to modernise the whole house while maintaining the original character, out of respect and sustainability, so we had to redo mouldings, restore original doors, windows and lamps while trying to turn the house into a work of art, maintaining Wright’s maxim: “A house is more of a home if it is a work of art”.

The pattern of the hall floor is formed through a system of overlapping layers with different colours and gradients. All the pieces are distinct and unique. The base figure is a square of lines that is repeated with different tones and offset from the previous one, so that the sum of 4 squares results in the final piece.