Zonas de Caracas

IGV-1

The Municipal Justice headquarters is located on a plot of just over 100 m2, as the visual endpoint where Avenida Francisco de Miranda and Calle Sucre meet. This vertex defines the triangular Plaza El Indio of Chacao in front of the headquarters. The building articulates the differences in urban scale between the taller constructions on the avenue and the low-rise buildings of Chacao’s historic city center. Despite the plot’s size, the work has over-hangs to gain greater area on the upper floors and has 830 m2 of construction distributed over five stories. Its shape has elements of classic construction: base, body and top. The base solves the access to the building and fosters building-plaza dialogue, while the transparent body allows you to see the activities going on inside. The top has an inclined folded and perforated cover that surrounds the building’s elements. The public nature of the building can be seen by the clock on its façade, which responds to the site’s urban scale. The metallic sun-blinds reduce the sun’s effect and emphasize the volume’s horizontality. The headquarters is an example of architecture that dialogues with the city and that, with its formal values, expresses the importance of transparency in public administration. It received an award in 2010, at the Third Architecture Biennial of Maracaibo.