The City of Culture is a new cultural center for the province of Galicia in northwestern Spain, designed by Eisenman Architects. Its design was developed from the superposition of three sets of information.
First, the street layout of the medieval center of Santiago is superimposed on a topographic map of the site overlooking the city. Second, a modern Cartesian grid is placed over these medieval routes.
Third, through modeling software, the topography of the slope allows distorting the two flat geometries, thus generating a topological surface that repositions the old and new in a simultaneous matrix never seen before.
The original center of Santiago is set to a urban planning figure / ground where the buildings are figurative or solid and the streets are residual or voids.
Through this mapping operation, the project appears as a curved surface that is neither figure nor ground but both in a form of land and a figurative substitute for urban shape of figure and ground of the old city.
The 6 project buildings are conceived as pairs t3: the Museum of Galicia and International Art Center, the Center for Music and Performing Arts and the Head Office building and the Library and Archives of Galicia Galicia.
The experiences of visitors to any building will be affected by their relationship with their immediate partner. Roads or pedestrian streets between the buildings, also open to a public square, surrounded by 6 buildings, landscape features and elements of water.
The largest building is the Performing Arts Theater, which will keep 42.5m high.
