The Granada Faculty of Architecture is located in a former military hospital. The conversion was awarded the Arquitectura Española 2015 prize.

Granada is characterized by two poles: The architecture bears stucco from the Muslim-Moorish dynasty, but the life of the inhabitants is typically Spanish. The narrow alleyways smell of cheap leather and oriental spices – in between tapas, Andalusian wine and the sounds of swallowed consonants.

Granada also developed from two urban cores. Albaicín, the Moorish quarter, winds its way up the hill north of the Alhambra. Gypsies built cave dwellings here from the 19th century onwards and brought flamenco to the city. The second historical core is the Realejo district, originally the Jewish quarter.

Granada, a city of education

Today, Granada is above all a university city – with 60,000 students, it is one of the largest educational institutions in Spain. The Escuela Técnica Superior Arquitectura, or ETS for short, was founded in 1994. For this purpose, the University of Granada acquired the building complex of a former military hospital located at the foot of the Alhambra – in the Realejo district.

In front of the campus is the oversized square “Campo del Principe”, which was created during the drastic urban planning changes of the Renaissance. From here, you can see the elongated façade of the ETS, which looks homogeneous with its white paint. In fact, behind it is an almost 14,000 square meter, historically grown network of buildings. At the end of the 1990s, this was to be made suitable for future architects to study. An international competition was held, which was won by Spanish architect Víctor López Cotelo.

The most important feature of the ensemble is the three inner courtyards: two of them are directly adjacent to each other and date back to the Renaissance, while the third and largest courtyard is located in the south-west of the complex and has been redesigned. These outdoor spaces provide orientation, not least because López Cotelo repeatedly creates visual connections to them and also to the surrounding alleyways. Despite the complexity of the building, it is therefore impossible to get lost. In order to create a system of paths without dead ends, it was necessary, among other things, to make openings – for example to the independent building of a former officers’ clinic, which was integrated into the complex in 1909 – which can still be seen today in the lower building height to the Campo del Principe.

You can find out more in Baumeister 1/2016

Students at Bochum University of Applied Sciences write letters to famous architects, here to the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava.

The “Archipedia” series is a cooperation between Baumeister and Bochum University of Applied Sciences, Department of Architecture. Students on the “Architecture Media Management” Master’s course write virtual letters to the crème de la crème of the architecture world, in this case to the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava.

Dear Mr. Calatrava,

What do you think about the increasing criticism of the buildings you have designed? How is it that so much structural damage occurs in your buildings and with your expertise?

Born in Valencia in 1951, you first studied architecture in Valencia from 1969 to 1973 at the Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura with a postgraduate degree in urbanism. This was followed from 1975 to 1979 by studies in civil engineering at the ETH Zurich, where you finally obtained your doctorate in 1981 with the topic “On the collapsibility of trusses”.

Thanks to your engineering knowledge, you specialized in the construction of bridges. Combining your engineering knowledge with a functional, organic-futuristic design approach, you designed a series of technically spectacular structures. You expressed your drive in an interview with these words: “Gravity is to an engineer what colors are to a painter.” You were certainly also inspired by Pier Luigi Nervi (1891 to 1979), an Italian civil engineer – as well as the Gothic style. Your designs are often based on natural structures, such as foliage, skeletons or wings. The preliminary designs are based on stylized forms of animals as rough sketches, which you simplify further and further until a draft of the building is recognizable. For example, the Satolas TGV station near Lyon, built between 1989 and 1994, is reminiscent of a bird with its distinctive roof shape.

But it is precisely this design approach that your critics criticize. The building’s purpose is not clear and its functions are not apparent at first glance. But perhaps that’s why your buildings are so popular with the general public? Satolas station, for example, has so far only been able to fulfill its planned goal for the region of forming an interface between the region, the adjacent airport and the passing TGV line to a limited extent, but is a popular excursion destination, especially for architectural laymen.

However, the many structural damages are increasingly causing you trouble. In 2007, for example, your home city of Valencia even hesitated to award you further commissions in addition to the Alameda metro station, completed in 1996, and the City of Arts and Sciences, completed in 2006. In the same year, you were honored by the Spanish government with the National Architecture Prize.

Are the structural details of your projects so difficult to implement? Or do you possibly not plan the constructive details properly, as a 2013 Baumeister architecture review with personal experiences about the construction of the train station in Zurich-Stadelhofen suggests? However, the media attention generated by the structural damage and the various legal disputes is unlikely to have a positive effect on your image, especially among architectural laypeople.

I wish you more positive media coverage in the future,

Patrick Beuchert

Biographical data of Santiago Calatrava

1951 born in Benimàmet, Valencia
1969-1973 Studied architecture and urbanism at the ETSA Valencia
1975-1979 Studied civil engineering at the ETH Zurich
1981 Doctorate with the topic “On the foldability of trusses” at ETH Zurich
1983-1990 Stadelhofen railroad station, Zurich
1987-1992 Alamillo Bridge over the Guadalquivir, Seville
1989-1994 Lyon-Saint-Exupéry TGV station, Lyon
1992-1996 Crown Prince Bridge, Berlin
1991-2006 Ciutat de les Arts i les Ciències – C.A.C. (City of Arts and Sciences), Valencia

Further reading

Calatrava, Santiago; Blaser, Werner (1988): Santiago Calatrava, Engineering Architecture. Basel, Boston: Birkäuser Verlag

Further weblinks

www.calatrava.com

www.patrick-beuchert.de

Portrait: “Calatrava IMG 2489” by 準建築人手札網站 Forgemind ArchiMedia – Flickr: IMG_2489.JPG. Licensed under CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons – http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Calatrava_IMG_2489.jpg#/media/File:Calatrava_IMG_2489.jpg
Foto: https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4041/4692528302_a03dd60c51_o.jpg