Architects: KOSMOS Architects, PARABASE
Area: 30 m²
Year: 2023
Photography: Laurian Ghinițoiu, GorokaStudio
Project Architects/Designers: Carla Ferrando Costansa, Blanca Garcia Gardelegui, Pablo Garrido Arnaiz, Artem Kitaev, Leonid Slonimskiy
Client: MODEL, Barcelona Architectures Festival
Curator: Eva Franch i Gilabert
City: Barcelona
Country: Spain
The “Permanently Temporary” Pavilion, designed by KOSMOS Architect and PARABASE for the Model Barcelona Architectures Festival 2023, highlights circular construction by using unused materials collected across Barcelona. Completed in 2023, the pavilion not only serves as a public space for community interaction but also functions as storage for reusable building resources, promoting sustainable design. Sourced from storage sites and buildings slated for demolition, the pavilion demonstrates how architecture can repurpose existing materials, encouraging public engagement with eco-friendly construction practices in the heart of the city.
We felt that in this specific context, the simplicity of creating an entrance by wrapping the textile envelope around the head of the ReUse statue was the right thing to do. At the same time, for us, it transformed the old stone statue into a kind of ready-made caryatid, reverberating with the caryatids of Erechtheion and those of Lubetkin in Highpoint II.
Interview with Carla Ferrando Costansa and Pablo Garrido Arnaiz of PARABASE
The installation highlights the hidden resources of the city and promotes circularity as a response to the environmental impact of construction. It operates as both a central storage for materials and a public space, proposing a new urban logistics model for material reuse.
The pavilion is built from everyday materials, assembled into vertical totems that symbolize their origins in peripheral storage sites.
The space invites the public to participate by exchanging materials—taking those they find in the pavilion and contributing their own. It also serves as a workshop and information point for discussions.
Permanently Temporary Pavilion underscores the circular life of materials, with components returned to storage after the festival for future use, allowing them to be repurposed in new projects.
Project Gallery
Project Location
Address: Barcelona City, Barcelona, Spain
Location is for general reference and may represent a city or country, not necessarily a precise address.
