As a city, Valencia is historically characterized by two interconnected elements: water and infrastructure.
This is especially true at the harbor, where the huge potential to develop industrial infrastructure remains untapped. Over the years, a number of architectural projects have been undertaken in the area. However, they have ended up decaying into non-existence due to their rejection by the space itself. Paradoxically, the space with the maximum usable surface area produces minimum usable architecture.
The industrial infrastructure at the harbor is entirely man-made, featuring a thick layer of synthetic concrete that dominates the surrounding area, including towns and rivers. Traditional architectural ideas relating to scale are clearly incapable of exploiting the harbor’s full potential. By freeing itself from traditional restrictions, this project intends to tackle paradoxical notions of scale and territorial issues. The hope is to create a new way of defining the scale different architecture belongs to.
The project is an exercise in “big” building. The idea is to speculate about the conditions of intensity, mass, use and temporality, while pushing the boundaries of what a building is.
