Lecture: Iñaqui Carnicero: “Second Hand Spaces”

Iñaqui Carnicero’s rich career as an architect and design professor includes designing a building for C.E.U. Polytechnic University, the restoration of an Arab Tower in Guadalajara, and a cultural multi-use center in a former slaughterhouse of Matadero-Madrid, among others.

Carnicero’s work has received numerous accolades, including the 2012 Design Vanguard Award from Architectural Record, the 2012 Hauser Award, the 2012 FAD Spanish Architecture and Public Opinion Award, the 2011 Emerging Architecture Award Architectural Review, and the 2009 Rome Prize. He has lectured at Cornell, Rice, Berkeley, Cervantes Institute in Prague, London Roca Gallery and many other prestigious institutions.

Lecture Description:

Two extreme architectural situations have been embraced in Madrid in the last 15 years. First came a short period of time when the city invested more in infrastructures and public buildings than any other term in history. After the excesses committed during the first period, an economic crisis is currently transforming design strategies and fostering interventions in the existing heritage. Building from scratch without considering what already exists is not an option anymore, and thus this new consideration of reality is promoting new directions in design.

Rome is a perfect precedent to demonstrate how it is possible for a city to be built and destroyed over the years while reusing almost the same materials. Some of the most important spaces in the city, such as the old temples and monuments, were reused in medieval times, frequently with humble programs far away from the sublime purposes for which were originally erected. In other cases the trace of destroyed ancient buildings have remained as the footprint of new constructions. This enticing dialogue between the past and the present is only possible when design provides a bridge of connection.

Considering time factors necessary in today’s society, it doesn’t make sense to talk about sustainability if we don’t first consider our buildings’ functional behaviour over the years. Transformation, adaptation and reuse are some of the strategies considered in our office to respond to the constant changes of our liquid society.

The Second Hand Spaces lecture will demonstrate projects built by the office in the last ten years. Specifically we will show how cities’ economical and political contexts offer unavoidable constrains, but which can be taken as an asset towards the production of a resolution. The projects will be framed in three categories or actions: redefining, reusing and adapting.

Relevant Works:

ArchDaily: The Works of Inaqui Carnicero

Webcast:

The event will be webcast. It may be watched live at 5:30 p.m. or after the event in the archive. View the lecture.

Special Thanks:

Carnicero’s visit is made possible by SPAIN arts & culture, a program organized by the Embassy of Spain’s Cultural Office, and the Spain-USA Foundation, a 501(c)3 institution, which is paying for Carnicero’s travels to the University of Tennessee.