Barcelona World Race

Barcelona World Race

The tugboat building, a master-built construction, dates from the beginning of the 20th century. Since then it has suffered a series of alterations of mediocre quality.

Given, moreover, that it is situated at the end of a row of buildings with the same colonial port look to them, the remodeling project posits the reconstruction of its central section—the most degraded structure—the repairing of the side towers, and solely proposes a new roof that, keeping to the maximum height, includes a huge skylight in its upper crown and big picture windows on either side of the walkway and the port.

The two-story building houses a shop, exhibition space and toilets within the ground floor, while on the top floor there is an office, storeroom, function room and large multiuse hall for institutional meetings.

The remodeling of the building is understood in terms of the group of buildings that succeed one another on this same front, all of them the object of a subsequent remodeling that the Port of Barcelona will be carrying out.

Without varying the height or the configuration of the pitched roof, the resolution of the roof of the central body responds to the notion of ribbing, through which the natural light penetrates and reflects by day, while making its presence felt as a great lighthouse by night.

In constructional terms, a system of panels for façade, beams, decking and piers, all prefabricated, goes to form the reconstructed central body, remaining true to the preexisting structure. On this is erected a rib-like structure punctuated by steel profiles, between which the glass surface is angled, thus permitting the entrance of light in its vertical and top part. The rigorously renovated side towers adapt their recesses and their inside spaces to the new program.

Lastly, the off-white color holds the entire building together, allowing the play of reflection, light and shadow of the new intervention to occupy center stage.