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Alonso de Garay Arquitectos transform derelict building into modern housing block
The strong territorial expansion of Mexico City in recent decades led to the carelessness and decay of many of the neighbourhoods with most history and tradition as Condesa, Roma, Juarez and others. Properties that during the last century belonged to families of the Mexican high society today are damaged by the accumulation of years without maintenance. In recent years, this deterioration was used by Mexican architects to begin recycling the neighbourhoods, using old buildings and turning them into pieces of modern architecture which led to these areas again to be the most expensive and desired of the Country’s Capital.
Sinaloa 193 is a last-century renovated building, it has 26 apartments on 6 levels, ranging from 56 sq m to 110 sq m. The architecture aims to be modern but simple, unpretentious, warm and very natural. Alonso de Garay Arquitectos sought contrasts between industrial and natural elements; cold textures of steel and aluminum with warm textures such as stone and wood.
The views were unspectacular, so the architects wanted a landscape design to serve as a curtain, sculptural elements on the idea of recycling scrap pieces heavily polluting materials turned into nests. The courtyards that were used only for the service, are now living gardens with trees and plants, likewise, much of the roof became green areas. The landscape design includes traditional species such as the Mexican Nopal. There are also ferns and bamboos.
In short, what was sought was the rebirth of a dead last-century building in the 21st century and used as a space not only for what it was created - housing - but also as a museum of plants, a space for the preservation of species a home for the waste that pollute our country and an example to follow recycling our city.
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