SPATIAL MECHANISMS FOR THE MODERN MEDITERRANEAN CITY Or a vertical casbah called Walden 7

Abstract

In 1971, on the outskirts of Barcelona, the team led by Ricardo Bofill, Taller de Arquitectura, built the building that we know today as Walden 7. This building, made up of more than 400 homes, was a proposal with which Taller de Arquitectura wanted to break with the sociopolitical situation of the time, both in the way of making collective housing and in the way of living. In contrast to the misunderstood housing block of the Modern Movement, Taller de Arquitectura wanted to recover the vibrant atmosphere of traditional mediterranean settlements, focusing on the design of communication spaces, turning these into a living space for the community of neighbors who inhabited Walden 7. Different mechanisms that we will study in this text, with which Taller de Arquitectura seeks to generate a community outside the ways of life of the time. A social experiment on the outskirts of Barcelona, with which the Taller wanted to introduce the germ of a new society for the future and that bore fruit.