Church Conversion in Vilanova de la Barca
- Jakob Schoof
After being hit by bombs in 1936, during the Spanish Civil War, all that survived of the Gothic church of Vilanova de la Barca was the apse, the façade with the main entrance, and parts of the side walls. It was only 73 years later that the Catalonian town decided to restore the church ruins to serve as a multi-purpose hall. In their design the architects focussed on clearly differentiating old and new through the use of colour: the steel roof trusses, the window reveals and frames as well as the new, twin leaf brick walls are all white. The outer shell consists of through-coloured solid bricks, laid at places in alternately projecting and recessed courses. The outer layer of bricks is continued in front of the windows as a filter wall that enables the homogeneous appearance of the building envelope to be preserved while still allowing natural light to enter the old church. This construction can be read as a contemporary interpretation of the traditional window grilles made of stone and known as transenne, which are often to be found in the pre-Romanesque churches of northern Spain. At the eaves and on the western gable end, which also had to be completed, the concrete ring beam required for structural reasons was covered by a smooth facing wall. In the interior of the building the concrete was given a coat of white paint.
