Calm on the Plain

Project

Daimús School

Status

Competition

Type

School

Year

2010

Location

Daimús, Spain

Credits

Marin Marinović
Susana Iñarra
Alex Ayala

A primary school on the plain of Daimús, on a site suspended between the mountains and the Mediterranean, where the landscape opens in long horizontal lines.

The project answers that landscape with calm. A low, horizontal building in timber, white concrete and stone sits among trees and hedges, letting nature and light take the lead. Natural materials were chosen to age gracefully and to blend with the colours of the surrounding fields and hills.

Toward the street, the classrooms open onto a sequence of small planted courtyards that act as a buffer, filtering noise and giving each class its own outdoor room. Behind them, the school turns inward: playgrounds, sports courts and shaded pergolas form a more intimate and peaceful world, protected from the street.

From the outset the plan was designed to grow. A future extension, practically doubling the programme, can be added along the same structure, so that the school will expand without losing its order or its scale.