Venice Biennale

Lacol was selected to present the La Borda building at the 2021 Venice Biennale. In our contribution, we offered a reflection on cooperative housing, focusing on how the La Borda project was developed: from the self-promotion by future residents, to the conception of a functional program supporting a more communal lifestyle, the architecture that shapes it, and how it is later modified and adapted by the people living there.

The La Borda project is understood as an example of experimentation in collective housing production. It has enabled the overcoming of some limitations commonly found in conventional public and private housing developments, which are traditionally designed without the involvement of the future residents—complete strangers to the process. This distance makes it impossible to introduce meaningful changes that might affect the established way of living and future management. Market logic and standardized practices are often imposed to ensure the assimilation of housing as a consumer product, leading to mediocre solutions. In contrast, the particularities of the cooperative model open up space to question the pre-established values and practices to which architecture must respond.

The installation space is defined by a single element: a large curtain near one of the existing pavilion walls. This gesture creates two spaces(one interior and one exterior) through which visitors must pass.

The curtain will be reused after the Biennale to reduce the environmental impact of our intervention. It will continue its lifecycle as a partition in the multipurpose space at La Borda. In this way, we bring a real part of the building to the exhibition, not just representations of it. Additionally, leftover cross-laminated timber from La Borda’s structure is used to create stools.

The curtain acts as a visible screen throughout the pavilion, with various sewn-in phrases appearing across it. These are testimonials from residents, expressing how their lives have changed since moving into the building, emphasizing the political impact of architecture.

On the interior side, displayed on tables based on Enzo Mari’s design, a series of photographs by Álvaro Valdecantos captures different parts of the building: façades, the interior courtyard, the double-height multipurpose space… and above all, the process of appropriation by residents, documented over several months. A large wooden model (scale 1:33) is also exhibited, showing a section of the building, including the courtyard, staircases, shared spaces, and roof structures.

Finally, a large screen in front of the stools shows two videos: one documenting the promotion process, including meetings and construction, and another depicting life in the building after the onset of COVID-19 and the lockdown. The video also provides ambient sound, bringing a sense of life to the installation.