 
 
 
 
 
when we talked about the content of our pavilion,
we felt we couldn't just explain who we were or what we’d done,
but that we really wanted to say okay,
we’re going to explain Venice so let's talk about our dreams.
And what is our dream?
Well, it’s a space that we're in love with, ever since we first started work on a country home in 2002,
we’ve had the chance to access all this space.
We were really excited to offer a
laboratory and research centre in the field of architecture
We received a call from RCR and the communications team
that organises the exhibitions for the Venice biennial,
with a space reserved for schools of architecture.
That's when they suggested that the students offer their work
as a reflection between man, nature and the Vall de Vianya.
We immediately started thinking about what we could do,
because it was a great opportunity for our students to have a learning experience
and also to showcase their work at the Venice biennial.
When RCR and the Bunka Foundation sent us the email at La Salle
offering to let us participate in the pavilion at the Venice biennial,
we thought that to set up a workshop with the students might be the way to make the most of the opportunity
and be able to better represent the qualities and educational intentions at our school.
As well as the direct, personal relationship we want to have with our students.
We were clear that this was not going to be an architectural project.
When we discussed whether to make it an architectural project,
because that was a very open question for us,
we saw that it had to be transversal.
With students from different years as well as teachers from different subjects.
Projects, compositions, drawings or landscaping.
It had to be very transversal in every way,
because by including different ways of thinking,
something good was sure to come out of it.
the purpose behind the laboratory and
the synergies established with companies and universities seemed a perfect fit.
There’s a determination that makes participation transversal.
Not just in terms of discipline but also across generations.
A place that's alive, where a lot of things happen.
A place where, deep down, you awaken, you enhance and you encourage creativity.
It seemed to us that it would be a good idea to approach all of the Catalan universities,
for them all to have a presence at the biennial
in order to reflect on what we learned from nature.
We do a workshop with RCR, which is a
really amazing group of architects here from Catalonia.
There are architects that are really involved with nature,
understanding nature and all of that.
So basically, what they ask is for all the universities, especially here,
to understand and what we learn about nature.
So, what La Salle decided to do is to come here to Olot, La Vall de Vianya,
which is where they work, and they have their workshop and everything.
Allow us to understand the nature that they were inspired in so many projects.
Above all, I believe it will be really useful in the sense of appreciating nature.
Personally, it's the first time I've gone on a trip to appreciate nature.
Pay attention, learn to look, close your eyes, feel, interpret,
think about where you would like to be.
In the sense that you're not only making a space,
but you have to imagine what the person will feel when they're in that space.
Not only what you built but the surroundings as well.
I feel that the most important thing about this workshop has really been to escape from Barcelona.
To get out of the classroom.
In the end, being an architect is about going out into the world and changing it.
It’s one thing to work as a student, in a classroom.
Cause when we go outside,
we begin to locate ourselves in relation to our environment.
I feel when you design something, when you sketch something,
when you think about someone, you reflect that.
If you can do it, insist on it.
When you’re affected by the wind, the smell, the taste.
Let's learn the sound. Let's learn why you can see with your eyes.
I feel all the senses come together.
Everything comes together to affect the way you design.
The first day we were invited to take part in the Venice biennial,
we were very clear that our experience should be an experience-based one.
Everything we do at the school is to help experience architecture, its different facets
and so we said: we have to come to Vianya, and we have to take advantage of the fact that
our students can come into contact with Pritzker prizewinners.
In fact, it's been a success because the passion that came about
when explaining to our students their profession,
it was contagious and that’s what the students have seen.
It’s added a lot of value.
At RCR, they have a way of doing architecture where they are always very aware of the place,
of the conditions around it, of the parts that come before the building.
They reflect a lot on this,
and these reflections lead them to make one type of architecture over another.
I think that at La Salle, they try to instil this study of the site
but not so much this part where we reflect on the site.
Really living and spending three days in a space, living the space and getting to know it.
It’s also important to do different activities such as drawing, among others,
as well as the lectures we enjoyed by Eugeni Bach and Bet Capdeferro.
I think it's been interesting to share several visions all focused on reflecting on architecture.
When we were there at their office, seeing the spaces and the materials,
I think that more than copying or getting ideas,
what we did was to go back to the essence of ideas and architecture.
We began to design our project without all the ideas and limitations you normally have at university,
such as course programme or the environment.
There’s all this pressure to do things quickly and to present it well.
Here we felt free.
Everyone had their ideas and there were practically no limits.
we proposed a much more abstract, non-defined space.
With a very short time for making decisions.
In two days we had to offer a proposal, some ideas,
reflect and launch the idea.
Almost all the groups ended up looking at the cycle of life.
Getting back in touch with nature.
We all live in a city with so much noise you can’t hear the silence.
Thanks to the workshop, we finally managed to.
We were able to draw the details of nature with our eyes closed.
In particular, this workshop has been very productive in a few concentrated days,
with input from an intense experience
visiting the offices of the winner of the Pritzker Prize last year.
We also accompanied the students with a large number of teachers,
helping to encourage creation and creativity within the group.
This is always a vital experience, both for teacher and student.
One of the things that surprised me most is that
through this relationship that they’ve discovered with both nature and with me,
they've immediately captured it all with drawings and a number of graphic resources on paper.
There was a number of resources to help explain the environment,
which, maybe because of the different rhythms we have in school,
this need for precision, or to do things with a certain technique,
we hadn't had time to try out.
Probably they realise now that they have lots of graphic resources, and that they have a strong expressive force,
and that allows them to explain things with a rhythm somewhere between
drawing their project and looking at the idea from a more philosophical point of view.
When you start out, you’re scared but happy, because you get to meet new people and
because you learn new ways of seeing architecture.
Being surrounded by this all day lets you work in a different way.
It's been great. And people can tell. It’s great here.
This workshop will lead us on to other things.
It’s the beginning of a new phase for the university, which is I think we want to go.
We can see it in our students’ faces.
They're happy. In three days, they've grown as people.
And that's what's most important, apart from learning.
The other important thing is to learn to see, and they’ve done that.
They've said things they never imagined they’d never thought they were able to.
