The Psychological and Pedagogical Center of Osona, located in Vic, is a daily center for community rehabilitation, labor insertion and social club for people with mental illness. The center proposed to relocate and concentrate the services in a single building, previously disintegrated.
Location: C/Josep Maria Selva 2
08500 VIC (BARCELONE)
SPAIN
Program: PSYCHOLOGICAL MEDICAL CENTER
AreaSize: 1.657 m2
Date of design: 2015
Date of completion: Winter 2016
Project team: COMAS-PONT ARQUITECTES SLP
Collaborators: Anna Prat
Maria Camps
Client: Fundació Centre Mèdic Psicopedagògic d’Osona
Consultants: Manuel Arguijo i associats
La Vola 1981 S.A.
SIS consultoria acústica
Vinclament slp
Photographer: Adrià Goula
The building is based on the repetition of a pavilion module separated by gardens and communicated with each other. It is developed only on a ground floor to facilitate the mobility of its users and at different levels (connected by ramps), adapting to the natural slope of the land. The distribution of the program and spaces aims to reinforce the relationship between users, preserve the necessary privacy, facilitate indoor-outdoor visual relationships and generate very domestic spaces.
The building has an economical, energy-sustainable and highly efficient construction system that adapts the energy demand according to its interior occupancy and exterior climate. Together with the domestic scale, the warmth of the materials inside and the relationship with nature make it a healthy building.
The modular metal structure, 6 meters wide every 2.40 meters, supports a light and ventilated vaulted roof. The section allows the roof void to be ventilated in summer to reduce the interior temperature, and closed in winter to keep the heat in and radiate it inward.
The North facades are characterized by a high thermal inertia section to avoid energy loss. On the South facades there is a porch-balcony with vegetable cultivation as a passive bioclimatic system. These spaces/greenhouses can be closed in winter to accumulate heat (and introduce it into the interior through the ventilation system) or open in summer to allow constant ventilation and function as a solar filter.
The center’s vegetable gardens and vegetation are cultivated by the center’s users as a rehabilitation therapy and job placement program.
For a more sustainable building it was decided to provide the climate contribution through a district heating/cooling option. The heating is distributed by a radiant floor and it is combined with a ventilation system that slightly cools the indoor air in summer.
The sustainability criteria have been essential during the construction process and have used natural and recycled materials as wood, OSB or cork that need relatively little maintenance. The Energy Certification places our building in the “A” category, the most efficient.
