Note: This article was originally published in 2017. Prices, opening hours and dates may have changed since.
the renowned Pritzker Prize is considered the Nobel Prize for architects. It is endowed with $100,000 and has been awarded by the Hyatt Foundation and a top-class jury since 1979. In 2017, he went to the three Catalan architects Rafael Aranda, Carme Pigem and Ramon Vilalta from Olot, Girona Province.
Work philosophy of the trio from Catalonia
The three architects have been working together under the label for almost 30 years RCR Arquitect. With your projects you create symbioses of space, light, shadow, atmosphere, environment, colors and landscape. Flowing rooms and an open overall concept are your concern. Architecture and nature merge into each other.
Jury Justification of the Pritzker Prize
The architects have a “strong sense for the places” where they build, for their history, materials and atmosphere. The architecture is “powerfully connected to its surroundings”, the “positioning of the buildings, the choice of material and geometry” emphasizes “always the natural environment and draws it into the interior of the houses”. Just as they “tightly connect with each other outside and inside, they also connect old and new in their works.” They use modern materials – glass, plastic and recycled steel.
Special feature of the award winners
For the first time, an office was awarded that deals intensively with the landscape and local history and works regionally in a connected manner. All three architects are connected to their homeland – not modern city nomads who studied on all continents and worked with the most famous architects. They prove that with the right sense of time and space, you can design modern, creative and cosmopolitan in any place.
Most projects realized RCR Arquitectes between Girona and Barcelona – Very close to your office in Olot.
renowned examples of their work
(1)The Bell-Lloc winery in Palamós from 2007. Folded steel walls crouch like sculptures in the vineyards.
(2) In Ripoll, they constructed a kind of theater stage in public space in 2011 – a cube open on two sides invites you to dialogue.
(3) In Olot, the transparent curved plastic roof of the Les Cols restaurant has been floating between old stone walls since 2011.
(4) In Barcelona in 2007 they built the complex “Sant Antoni” with library, retirement home and gardens.
(5) Girona’s Faculty of Law was also built by RCR.
(6) In 2010, a screeching kindergarten was created in Besalú under her leadership in cooperation with J. Puigcorbé.
(7) In France, the Soulages Museum has been in Rodez since 2014, which was created in cooperation with G. Trégouët and received great attention.
All your projects convince with balance. Cosmopolitanism coupled with homeland ties are the success concept of RCR Arquitectes.
