Cooking school in former slaughterhouse, Spain
In Medina Sidonia, near Cádiz, in the south of Spain, a former slaughterhouse was converted into a professional cooking school. New clay roof tiles mirror the roof tiling method of the historic city, and the bright whitewashed walls are equally compliant with regional traditions. The historic building section – inclusive of Phoenician columns – accommodates public facilities like a restaurant and a bar, whereas the classrooms and the kitchen are located in the new annexe. In the latter, special ceramic tiles provide for hygiene and slip resistance.
Pavol Panak, member of the jury says: “As the winning project of the “Urban Infill” category, we have chosen the conversion of a former slaughterhouse into a cooking school. In the sense of its spatial organization and its materiality, the project is very much inspired by local tradition, but it deals with it in a very contemporary way. The way the ceramics are used on the roof of the school enriches the silhouette of the town in a traditional but non-sentimental way. Those are the outstanding qualities of this project. Unusually, it uses just one type of brick and one type of tile for all the vertical and sloping areas as well as the horizontal surfaces. This gives the building a sense of monomateriality.”
