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1. Can Sau before its demolition Vacant lot after demolition

4. Emergency scenery

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1. Can Sau before its demolition Vacant lot after demolition

4. Emergency scenery

10m50 2,5

1. Can Sau before its demolition Vacant lot after demolition

4. Emergency scenery

10m50 2,5

1. Can Sau before its demolition Vacant lot after demolition

4. Emergency scenery

10m50 2,5

1. Can Sau before its demolition Vacant lot after demolition

4. Emergency scenery

10m50 2,5

1. Can Sau before its demolition Vacant lot after demolition

4. Emergency scenery

10m50 2,5

1. Can Sau before its demolition Vacant lot after demolition

4. Emergency scenery

10m50 2,5

1. Can Sau before the demolition2. Alignment with the road as per the town planning

3. Empty plot after demolition4. Emergency scenario

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Demolition continues in the old dis-trict of Olot. For many reasons, but always with the same consequences: abandoned plots, loss of urbanity, dis-figurement of the street, destruction of the ordinary streetscape. Half of Can Sau, tangential to the Tura shrine, was affected by road alignment needs. The rest of the plot, presided over by a common wall and four staggered but-tresses, was empty. The land is zoned for building, but there were no plans in sight.

With an application made for pave-ment and provisional urban furniture and a contract in progress for water-proof sheet metal cladding, it was time to rethink the intervention. It was ur-

gent to allocate resources to the verti-cal plane to ensure that the common wall was watertight and stable. And, above all, to equip the space with an urban feeling: façades are responsible for shaping the street in this dense city.

Emergency scenery was built with hol-low brick, following the lines suggest-ed by the buttresses, revealing traces of former inhabitants’ homes visible on the common wall peeking through in the background. A construction with three vaults and four niches has created a public space by way of a po-rous façade, with several isolated steps. It is an unfinished and adaptable struc-ture, a lovely set design for urban life.

The intervention recognises that cities are the fruit of ongoing construction, building on their strata, and highlight-ing the conglomerate of past layers. This scenography relates a dreamlike and symbolic history, while reclassify-ing this abandoned lot.

The main structures are defined with hollow bricks and sealed with lime mortar. It was deemed suitable to fin-ish the load-bearing walls and resolve the vaults with a layer. These materials are also very economical and their use is widespread, so local builders could be hired. Steel was reserved for the arch supports, the crosspieces and the pair of reinforced columns.

Existing wall. As found.

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Can Sau. Emergency SceneryEstablishment and adaptation of a common wall in the city centre of Olot, 2019

unparelld’arquitectes: Eduard Callís, Guillem Moliner + Quim Domene. visual artist / Category B