LB 22 JOSEP FERRANDO centro social

LB 22 JOSEP FERRANDO social center, is the twenty-second title from LONG BOOKS COLLECTION and as the special support from Vesta and Dvesta foundation.

"El Roser" Social Center is situated in the former remand prison building in Reus, a designated Cultural Asset of Local Interest (BCIL) and part of the Inventory of Architectural Heritage of Catalonia.

This public facility represents an innovative program within the country. It encompasses a homeless shelter, a soup kitchen, and a community space, thereby centralizing the city’s social services and becoming the first comprehensive establishment of its kind. The proposal exemplifies a transformation of a transformation. Initially built as a prison in 1929, the building was converted into a school in 1979. This historical layering is utilized to engage with various temporal strata, conducting a process that unveils and exposes the hidden construction layers and their different transformations.

The project honours and restores the original structure, revealing the construction typology of its era, previously concealed, and evoking an image of austerity. The intervention operates on multiple scales. A dialogue is established between the new elements, characterized by their ethereal, light, and tectonic nature, and the existing structure, composed of heavier, stereotomic mineral materials.

Additionally, new transversal openings are introduced to the “H” plan geometry, encircling two courtyards. These openings, through visual permeability, reinterpret the formerly enclosed spaces in a manner reminiscent of Palladian architecture. This reconsideration extends to the building’s internal functionality and circulation, as well as its urban context. (…)