Detail of the project ed. 2024

capil­la-de-la-tier­ra-chapel-of-the-earth / Mexico

Design­er	Enrique Javier Cabr­era Peniche
Loca­tion	Res­i­den­cial Baspul, 97342, Chicx­u­lub Pueblo, Yucatán
Nation	Mex­i­co
Design Team	Lead Archi­tect Enrique Cabr­era Peniche Arq­ta. Ale­jan­dra Andrade Butzmann Arq. Alber­to Var­gas Díaz M.Arq.Psj. Jorge Enriquez Dominguez
Year	2020
Pho­to credits	Capilla_01 Enrique Cabrera Capilla_02 Enrique Cabrera Capilla_03 Tama­ra Uribe Capilla_04 Tama­ra Uribe Capilla_05 Tama­ra Uribe Capilla_06 Tama­ra Uribe Capilla_07 Tama­ra Uribe Capilla_08 Tama­ra Uribe Capilla_09 Tama­ra Uribe Capilla_10 Tama­ra Uribe

Pho­to external

Project descrip­tion

The Chapel of the Earth is para­dox­i­cal­ly ‘built’ by gen­er­at­ing an emp­ty space that mim­ics dis­ap­pear­ing from the imme­di­ate land­scape of its sur­round­ings. It is intend­ed to be a place of reflec­tion, silence, and prayer, as well as hav­ing an intrin­sic con­nec­tion with nature.
To enter it, we need to walk along a gen­tly slop­ing ramp accom­pa­nied by Cha­ka trees, a path that seems to lead into the depth of the earth, expos­ing its walls where nat­ur­al tex­tures invade the cracks of the lay­ers of time, where one can enjoy the sounds of nature and the silence of the emp­ty space.
Once the jour­ney has end­ed, you are greet­ed by the cov­er­ing over the only nave which has a dual func­tion: on one hand, visu­al­ly delim­its in three parts — altar, nave, and access ramp — a vol­ume mere­ly made of air; on the oth­er hand, it hier­ar­chizes them with a play of lights and shad­ows to achieve the promi­nence that the altar requires. The walls of liv­ing rock sup­port a vault­ed con­crete roof that does not intend to com­pete with the expres­sive­ness of mil­lions of years of geo­log­i­cal for­ma­tion. Two rows of bench­es nar­row the path to frame the most impor­tant space: The Altar.
The Altar seems to be the end of a cav­ern with the vault open, cre­at­ing a win­dow to the sky. At the end of the cav­ern is a body of water, ref­er­enc­ing the cenotes that form as part of an under­ground riv­er of the many that have their course in the sub­soil of the penin­su­la. This fur­ther gen­er­ates a sense of iso­la­tion and reflec­tion, pro­vid­ing the ide­al space to find oneself.
Only two ele­ments stand out in the con­text: the ‘frame’ of the entrance that delim­its the atri­um, where the jour­ney begins and grad­u­al­ly the ‘ora­tor’ becomes detached from the exter­nal envi­ron­ment. And the ‘cross’ on the edge of the square void, made of pre­fab­ri­cat­ed con­crete that allows the space’s voca­tion to be iden­ti­fied from afar.
‘The Chapel of the Earth’ allows for a free inter­pre­ta­tion by the ‘ora­tor’. It does not intend to impose a les­son on space, on the con­trary, it invites one to take own­er­ship of it depend­ing on the moment, the weath­er, the light, and the time.
The project is a free, sim­ple pro­pos­al that aims to resolve a space with the min­i­mum ele­ments, two walls that sub­tly sep­a­rate as they delve into the under­ground. For us, it is a pow­er­ful­ly sim­ple and expres­sive work.

Explana­to­ry report of the project
Down­load report

Pho­to internal

Tech­ni­cal drawings

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