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In the words of Fernando Higueras himself, this project should be understood as “a building between dividing walls that sticks at all times to the boundaries (heights, setbacks, etc.) that the town hall marked”. The site, located in an area of ​​undoubted historical value on the corner of Alberto Aguilera and San Bernardo, was occupied by the old Hospital de la Princesa. Divided in two by Santa Cruz de Marcenado Street, the project is structured in two blocks A and B that are separately adapted to their own urban constraints. The square that is generated between them, originally open to the city, has a privileged orientation that allows it to receive the midday light. Block A (next to the San Bernardo roundabout) is organised around a generously sized interior patio that provides greater ventilation and lighting in the housing service area. In addition, due to its continuity and formal richness, it provides unobstructed perspectives on the interior street intended for pedestrian access.

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Below ground, the building is made up of four parking floors with natural ventilation and lighting through four enormous circular patios designed so that, just like light, the vegetation enters and grows freely.

 Attention to the detailed and beautiful designs that perfectly integrates the pre-existing brick building with the new intervention, a beautiful underground dialog of dark and light with new materials such as steel glass and warm wood interiors in the case of theatrical spaces.

Text by the architect:

In 1717, Pedro de Ribera drew the first project of the Conde Duque barracks in Madrid. It had to provide answers for an ambitious program to house the more than 600 men and 400 horses of the Royal Guard. 

In 2004, with the drafting of the Plan Director, began a new adventure in the life of the Conde Duque, which finished with the completion of the works in 2011, after a total and coordinated renovation of the whole building. 

The first images of its naked interior were open naves of brick arches on granite pillars and at other levels, wrought columns and riveted beams. Clean and austere spaces covered with solid brick structures.  The powerful space called for an obvious solution: to maintain the skeleton, to remove additions and to concentrate the new interventions. The aim was to achieve a big neutral container where new timeless objects and specific elements could be situated.

The program proposed by the City of Madrid was aware of those premises and facilitated the task. It essentially wanted to create places of interaction, multi-use spaces and a small collection of venues for the development of activities (a concert hall, a theatre, an assembly hall…). The interior courtyards shape the vast and diverse program. They are also an opportunity to recover open spaces and to allow the indoors and outdoors flow. The building is still very hermetic towards the exterior, but these courts offer a friendly and accessible face. They mean the antechamber, the place of approach, the possibility of understanding.