The building completes the last designated public plot in the southern part of the San Miguel area of Basauri. It's located on the edge of the municipality, a site where the urban fabric begins to thin out and revert to nature, moving away from the densely industrial urban sprawl of Greater Bilbao. The area has strong historical significance in Basauri, with the immediate presence of the Taberna Mayor manor house, the originally 18th-century town hall and now a cultural center. The neighborhood also features notable workers' housing complexes such as the La Unión de Elejalde group (1925) and the Hernán Cortés group (1955), and has experienced significant contemporary growth.
The program comprises eighteen public social housing units, employing a strong serial design strategy that manages the somewhat haphazard, irregular L-shaped geometry of the site. The choice of corridor access to the units aims to maximize the use of building space and resources. Given the building's small size, a single vertical core provides access to six units per floor, and open horizontal walkways allow access to all units along the L-shaped layout. This results in a space with minimal mechanical requirements and, consequently, low fixed maintenance costs (it does not require forced ventilation, artificial lighting is only needed at night…).
According to Basque habitability regulations, this type of apartment is the simplest form of dwelling. These are small units. This leads us to consider, beyond the regulatory requirements that define the minimum program and surface area, what qualities constitute this minimal house. The through-plan layout, in addition to passive climate control advantages, balances the lighting conditions, and therefore the usability of the entire space. The presence of openings and the balcony extension on both facades enhance the spatial perception of this minimal house.
The structural definition is simple. This condition combined with the serialization and repetition of the type, in addition to adhering to budget constraints, facilitates maintenance and possible future adaptations to program changes.
In this approach of compliance with minimums to social housing, each element contributes to the building's meaning. Thus, the composition of each functional element is integrated within the whole. The same ironwork that adorns the balconies, substructure and protective elements, extends to the roof, supporting the solar panels. The series of vertical openings and the stone plinth are a nod to Taberna Mayor. The volume of the staircase, attached externally to the access corridors, and the red chimney housing the main utility risers complete the entrance galleries.
The resulting image, a combination of all these elements, is a kind of tower house, a fortress on the very border of San Miguel, a traditional house, and without responding to any specific cliché, a community building of our time.