Sports Innovation Centre The Ring

Description

This project articulates a brief for an R&D sports technology centre focused on nature-related activities. The site is located on a peninsula in the  Gabriel y Galán Reservoir in Cáceres Province, with seasonal changes in the water level. The building's location is therefore set on a safe level. The roughly 6,000 m2 programme is stretched to produce a 630 m circular structure, ensuring that the building is always only partly visible. In other words, a fragment insinuates the entire building, although the only way to really appreciate the whole structure is from the air. This big scale dilutes the project into its surroundings. The building also becomes an artefact that seems alien to its location, materialized by means of a dry construction system with assembled components, integrated with the landscape by contrast. The structure rises off the ground without changing the topography, thus reducing its impact on the site. Contact points are minimised by defining a single raised level which creates a complex, varied spatial relationship with the immediate topography.(Description provided by José María Sánchez García)