Azahar

Its color is all that distinguishes the architecture from the landscape, but the Azahar headquarters are a veritable fragment of mountain, of rock flowering only steps away from the highest peaks of the Montes Universales. From among the numerous works by Carlos Ferrater, at first sight the researches suggested by the architect to the Science Park in Granada and to the House for a photographer in Tarragona seem to cheerfully return to make up the new synthesis Castellón's project. The expansion of the botanical garden of Barcelona was the magistral test bench for the external arrangements, for the in-nature paths and for the management of the organic shapes. The floors, contact surfaces with the ground, are made of stone – rock on rock. The plan of the building is H shaped and its core follows an east-west orientation, allowing the sky and other natural elements to penetrate deep inside, to reach the very core of the building. In one of these two artificial coves, the terrain is completely adapted to use by man – it is paved. The tiles are laid in a precise and ordered geometry, within an organic perimeter. Rectangular slabs, following a north-south orientation, with overriding in the center line, are equipped with lighted fixtures in the center of a few slabs, regularly alternating with non-lighted ones. Inside, the tile carpet follows the outdoor thread, but without the lighted inserts. The horizontal floor, on which the vertical partitions are freely arranged, is gray and homogeneous. The joints between the tiles are filled with cement mortar and are slightly deeper on the outer borders. In the other cove, symmetric to the first, nature preserves its own space, except for a paved walking edge. In this sidewalk, near the working space, the slabs are orthogonally positioned regarding the perimeter glass windows. Inside are 2 cm-thick polished pietra serena standstone, and outside are 3 cm-thick extra strong sand-blasted sandstone slabs.