Detail of the project ed. 2020

MAPA – CHAPEL IN SACROMONTE

Design­er Mauri­cio López
Loca­tion Cara­pé Moun­tain, Range, Mal­don­a­do, Uruguay
Design Team

MAPA
Part­ners: Luciano Andrades, Matías Car­ballal, Andrés Gob­ba, Mauri­cio López, Sil­vio Machado.
Project team: Pablo Cour­reges, Diego Mor­era, Emil­iano Lago, Fabián Sarub­bi, San­dra Rodríguez, Rafael Solano, Agustín Dieste, Alba Álvarez, Miquel Castel­là, Mar­cos Gómara, Vic­to­ria Reibakas, Sebastián Lam­bert, Lucy Braun­stein, Marie-Lise Hof­stet­ter, Claire Gar­dan, Hele­na Utzig, Joao Bernardi.
Year 2017
Pho­to credits

Exter­nal
Pho­tos by Tali Kimelman
Internal
Pho­to 1,3,4,5 by Tali Kimelman
Pho­to 2 by Leonar­do Finotti

Pho­to external

Project descrip­tion

SACROMONTE CHAPEL
Sacromonte, Sier­ras del Cara­pé, Mal­don­a­do, Uruguay
2017

The Sacromonte Chapel finds its place among vine­yards, lagoons, hills and shel­ters. Con­ceived as a land­scape ampli­fi­er, it blends with its sur­round­ings tak­ing the sen­so­r­i­al expe­ri­ence of nature to a whole new level.
How should the sacred spaces of the 21st cen­tu­ry be? The chapel pon­ders pos­si­ble inter­pre­ta­tions of this and oth­er ques­tions through its ambigu­ous rela­tion­ship with mat­ter, space and time. A peace­ful ten­sion reigns when in con­tact with it. A ten­sion between weight and light­ness, pres­ence and dis­ap­pear­ance, tech­nol­o­gy and nature. Enig­mat­ic and mys­ti­fy­ing, it leaves its vis­i­tors with more ques­tions than answers.
★ Selec­tion, XI Ibero-Amer­i­­can Archi­tec­ture and Urban­ism Bien­ni­al 2019
★ Long List Dezeen Awards — Small Build­ing — Sacromonte Chapel, Unit­ed Kingdom
★ Fea­tured Panora­ma of the Usi­na de Inno­vación Colec­ti­va of the Uni­ver­si­ty of the Repub­lic, Uruguay
—
The chapel start­ed in a fac­to­ry in Por­tu­gal. Once pre­fab­ri­cat­ed in cross-lam­i­­nat­ed tim­ber and steel, it was trans­port­ed direct­ly to the land­scape of Sacromonte to be assem­bled in one day. Sim­ple and aus­tere, its design assumes the chal­lenge of con­vey­ing a pow­er­ful mes­sage using the low­est amount of resources possible.

Two 9x6 meter wood­en planes rest sub­tly on one anoth­er but with­out touch­ing. From this sim­ple and unique ges­ture, a new enclo­sure is born. Nei­ther closed nor com­plete­ly open, it is a space in itself but it is part of its envi­ron­ment at the same time. Inside, the planes try to pro­tect and sanc­ti­fy a small por­tion of the land­scape but respect­ful­ly deny its con­fine­ment. Thus, the con­cepts of inte­ri­or and exte­ri­or are dilut­ed in a dif­fuse and ambigu­ous spa­tial experience.

Almost mag­i­cal­ly, a float­ing black metal­lic box breaks the sym­me­try in a tran­scen­den­tal act. Light enters through its out­er face, a sheet of translu­cent onyx. Inside it, the Vir­gin of “La Car­rodil­la” finds shel­ter and protection.

The chapel coex­ists har­mo­nious­ly with nature, let­ting in winds and storms. In some way, there is a rem­i­nis­cence of the most prim­i­tive of archi­tec­tures. One that reunites humans, land­scape and mat­ter with the eternal.

Illus­tra­tive project report
Down­load report

Pho­to internal

Tech­ni­cal drawings

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