Drago School

This building, with its great white facade overlooking the sea, is conceived of as a continuation of the long and extensive white walls of the old “maritime” cemetery of Cádiz. A finished volume is worked with in order to mend the urban fabric within the limits marked by the streets. The irregular trapezoidal site is regularized through the efficient mechanism of square courtyard around which the circulation winds. Its square form is accentuated by four palms arranged on its stone paving. The more public spaces are located in the part of the building which looks to the sea, and are more intensely controlled. A deep, double order opening, expresses to the city the public nature of the building, and groups together the library and cafeteria spaces. The shadowed depth is tensed by the solid sunlight captured by the high circular skylight. The space which hierarchically presides over the building is the main triple height hall where all of the circulation patterns converge. Its verticality is tensed by diagonal light from the high skylights, and made continuous by the eye-opening to the sea, supported by an intermediate plane which makes that view possible. A vertical space tensed by a diagonal light. Se concibe el edificio con su gran fachada blanca sobre el mar, en continuidad con las largas y grandes blancas tapias del antiguo cementerio “marino” de Cádiz. Se trabaja sobre el volumen completo que recompone el tejido de la ciudad sobre los límites de sus calles. Se ordena el espacio general de base irregular trapezoidal con el eficaz mecanismo de un patio regular cuadrado a cuyo alrededor gira su circulación. Se acentúa su cuadratura con cuatro palmeras sobre el suelo de piedra. En la parte del edificio que da al mar, al oeste, se sitúan sus espacios más públicos, en los que se interviene con mayor intensidad.