Radio Telescope ALMA Base of Operations

by Iglesis Prat Arquitectos

©Jorge Iglesis y Leopoldo Prat

©Jorge Iglesis y Leopoldo Prat

Architects: Jorge Iglesis G. y Leopoldo Prat V.
Associate Architects: Fitchner Bauconsulting GMBH, Alemania
Managing Architect: Pablo Molina P. (wow)
Owner : European South Observatory
Main Contractor: Vial Vives Mena y Ovalle
Engineering and specializations: EPS
Predominant materials: Metallic structure and panels
Site Area: 58.250 m²
GFA: 9.000 m²
Location: San Pedro de Atacama, Región de Antofagasta
Construction Completion Date: 2008
Photographs: Jorge Iglesis y Leopoldo Prat

In this work located in the north of Chile, the idea of dwelling in the desert inside a great curved wall as in a Pre-Hispanic citadel and fortress is materialized with a continuous border of stone and sand. The regulating axes are given by the paths to the village of San Pedro or to the antennas and the views of the Láscar and Licancabur volcanoes. Water streams flow into the patios. Walls and shading trellises configure the spaces. Shading is necessary in order to live facing the Salar (salt flat), and walls to reduce the immensity of the Atacama Desert.

Architecture that is founded on the spirit of the place. The place, beyond territory and topography, is landscape and views, light and weather. Being in tune with the place means to know it, listening and learning to make good use of what it offers. Being sustainable in that place means to convert problems into strengths, into design challenges that allow the architecture to happily shelter the inhabitant. Managing solar radiation, controlling light and making it gentle. Producing necessary ventilation for a friendly climate. Conserve energy; extract it from renewable sources, converting natural and inexhaustible resources into power supplies for the buildings. Growing roots in the place, belonging to it and knowing how to place oneself in its context.

The ALMA compound (Atacama Large Millimeter Array) is organized based on protected patios that control the relationships with the exterior. Shaded patios with Tamarugo trees create inner oases which are found along the paths and openings.

A double roof shields the interior spaces. A large overhead shading trellis stops the sun from reaching the rooftops and creates cross air ventilation that cools the enclosures during the day; at night, it prevents the cold fog from the Atacama desert to descend and deposit on the roofs, maintaining the heat inside when temperatures fall below zero.

The zone’s stone claddings have high thermal inertia, and they keep in the heat or release it when it is cold. Solar energy is captured by radiators that store and use it for heating and sanitary engineering purposes.

The buildings are totally pre-fabricated and were only set up on site. The place is anchored down by other things, and it is in these things where the value of its architecture remains.

Architecture has to be deeply regional. All design solutions should consider traditional construction wisdom that for centuries has been preserved in their places of origin, and with sensitivity, reinterpret these solutions in a contemporary and efficient way. There are teachings in tradition that need to be discovered. Shapes, volumes, spaces and materials can be reinterpreted today with new ones, or with the same and a new vision.

The best architecture, the one that transcends and becomes universal, is intensely regional.

The idea, the project, the surroundings and materials come together in the built work. There it stands, in the middle of nowhere, and in the view of everyone, with its strengths and weaknesses, to be judged by one and all.