Leon de Grief Library Park

Three concrete building volumes with red facade panels line a grassy slope beside a curving paved path.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti

LEON DE GRIEF LIBRARY PARK

Giancarlo Mazzanti

ARCHITECTS
Giancarlo Mazzanti

AREA
6.8 m2

YEAR
2007

LOCATION
Medellin , Colombia

CATEGORY
Public Space , Library

Text description provided by architect.

The aim is to establish a project that enables the biggest amount of urban connections and the development of public spaces.

A covered walkway beside red facade panels overlooks two concrete library volumes and the surrounding hills.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
A large projecting concrete volume rises above the sloping lawn, with smaller red-accented modules behind it.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti

To achieve this, there are several proposals such as enabling the roofing of the building as public space, empowering meeting places and developing viewing-points which overlook the city.

ZONAL EQUIPMENT - MANAGEMENT STRATEGY

The model allows the usage of communal facilities as small open spaced theatres, viewing-points, small plazas and sport fields when placing them on the rooftop, leaving plain borders as vacuums inside the lot and thus enabling their external use.

Elevated view of a broad flat concrete roof above the lawn, with a red-accented wing and neighborhood beyond.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Vertical wooden facade slats shade a concrete walkway beside a grassy terrace and city view.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti

We propose a management program between the EDU and the Culture Secretariat called "Film, Music and Theatre in my quarter".

This will allow the usage of the above mentioned roofing as auditoriums so that every two weeks a cultural show can be taken to each quarter.

Wood-plank walkway under a deep roof overhang, looking toward a concrete module with red facade panels.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
A planted courtyard with a palm tree sits between concrete wings, alongside a raised wooden deck.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti

The place presents itself as a green viewing-point and a territory of connections between the lower and upper zones of the quarter, which are actually used as areas for sport activities.

The project we propose will redefine the existing paths and empower the creation of shaded plazas on the library's rooftop.

As a result, it will not only multiply the connections because the building will be an obliged path, but it will create more and more events as people intertwine in the public spaces provided around the library.

Sunlight passes through vertical wooden slats onto a concrete wall and ledge.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
A person sits on an orange bench beside a full-height slatted window overlooking the city.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Two orange benches sit before a long wall of vertical wooden slats.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti

More than a transformation, we want to re-interpret the space so that it can be recreated into a symbolic place for the city.

The project will consist of a system conformed by three contained, rotated, squared modules that turn, adapting themselves to the landscape and the view and one curved module that unites and relates the other modules and that, in addition, allows other uses.

Orange benches occupy a sunlit interior corridor with wooden screens and a planted courtyard beyond.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Visitors walk past orange benches in a bright room screened by vertical wooden slats.

The project is a landscape that gives the urban geography continuity through the paths and the building of public space on the rooftop, a landscape constituted by paths, theatres or inclined plazas, a spatial network with connection multiplicity and meeting places.

1. CONTAINER 1 - COMMUNITY CENTER - User: individual and in groups. Time: 24 hours. Multiple Salons (quarter meetings), my quarter, gymnasium, sieve, technical substation (optimizing the land cut left by housing).

Library users read and study at tables beside a wide window overlooking Medellín.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Visitors relax on red floor cushions beside a tall glazed wall with views of the grassy grounds.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti

4. CURVED CONTAINER - 24 hours. Can be used as support. Exposition rooms (as obliged path for all users), cafeteria, management, bathrooms, ludotechs (will be used as kinder gardens 24 hours).

Structural system in reinforced concrete, in porches and screens. Each container module is structurally independent from the curved connector.

Library users browse books and gather around a bright green seating area beside an open interior railing.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Bright green oval seating surrounding an opening in the library interior, with tables and chairs behind glass.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti

Modules are conformed by screens in the ends to compensate the projection afore mentioned and in the center 2 axes of rectangular columns in concrete.

The connector is proposed in a reticule of metallic columns filled with concrete and a contention wall in stone gabion and concrete in the rear part.

Vinyl floors in different colors and shapes limiting pedagogic areas. Visible roofing in white concrete with inferior cake and wooden panels of 5 cm planks. White antique concrete walls.

Orange low seats in a concrete interior beside timber-screened windows.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
People look out over Medellín from a timber-decked rooftop terrace designed by Giancarlo Mazzanti Architects.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti

Crystal plates in sandwich with colored resin on the inside to mark and provide some color to the pedagogic areas. The mobile panels of the façade in folded cool rolled planks and curved borders with elements in teka wood.

Following this, the Container Module 1 is thought to have 3 floors, using the tilt of 12 meters left by housing.

Interior courtyard with palm trees, a raised timber deck, and a curved white roof beside the library rooms.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Palm-lined paved courtyard between the library's concrete wings, with red façade panels.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti

Circulation systems crossed airs through the mentioned patios, which allow cold air to displace hot air. We propose the usage of natural air cooling systems, nurturing the inside of the library with fresh air.

In addition to this, we want mobile blinds to cover the windows that face the sunset so that the effect of sunlight can be minimized. On top of the roofing-view points, we propose the plantation to trees to provide shadow.

The library's illuminated low-rise wings at night, with Medellín's hillside neighborhoods behind.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti


Aerial view of the library buildings and surrounding green grounds within Medellín's hillside cityscape.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Elevated view of the library's angular concrete buildings and rooftop spaces amid the surrounding neighborhood.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Long view of the library's connected concrete volumes and red façade panels, with housing on the hillside behind.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Concrete library wings and their red façade panels reflected in a glazed exterior wall.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Concrete library volume elevated above a dark base, with red vertical façade panels and a young tree in the lawn.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Close view of a projecting concrete library volume beside a glazed façade and lawn.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
People stand on a rooftop viewing deck beneath a deep concrete overhang, looking toward the city.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Two concrete library blocks with red façade panels stand beside a curved path across the lawn.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
The library's illuminated wings at dusk, set below a densely built hillside.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti
Aerial night view of the illuminated library complex amid the lights of Medellín.
© Giancarlo Mazzanti


Plan drawing showing the library’s three rotated modules and their interior layouts.
Roof plan drawing of the three library modules, with planted areas and roof surfaces shown.


Building section showing a library module set into the sloping site, with a tree above the roof.
Longitudinal building section showing a sloped roof surface, interior levels, and a tree on the roof.
Building section showing interior levels, a sloping roof, and a tree above the library.