In the same way that societies transform, times change, and cities evolve, industrial architecture modernizes and technifies, sometimes reaching a state of abandonment or ruin. Understanding its value as a built legacy and being vestiges of technological, social, and cultural changes, the renovation and/or conversion of numerous factories and industrial warehouses can lead to the revitalization, recovery, or growth of various areas in large cities, incorporating new uses and spaces for the enjoyment of their citizens.
Industrial buildings complement the urban identity of cities and represent an opportunity to act on pre-existing conditions, providing the possibility to reflect on restoration, conservation, intervention, and rehabilitation criteria, among others. Considering forward-thinking and vision, the transformation of these spaces can achieve benefits in urban habitat in the short, medium, and long term, as well as comprehensive improvements in the quality of life of communities. Now, how can one intervene in an industrial building appropriately and adapt it to a new use to give it a second life?
From Factories to Offices
Scattered throughout the geography of cities, the simplicity of factory buildings is characterized by a material simplicity where brick or concrete typically stands out in their composition and spatiality. The use of large-span structures on display reflects an architecture primarily of a functional nature, designed for a specific purpose but representing a documentary object from past eras that can often be utilized or preserved. Given their adaptability and flexibility to accommodate different uses, many architecture professionals propose hosting workspaces, offices, and/or coworking practices in spaces where large factories, warehouses, and industrial warehouses previously operated.
Domino Sugar Refinery / PAU - Practice for Architecture and Urbanism
- Location: Brooklyn, United States
- Year: 2023
"Like the Brooklyn Navy Yard and Industry City, the Domino Sugar Refinery will soon return to life as the nerve center of a new working waterfront. An industrial urban landmark constructed by Henry Havemeyer, the building long dominated both Brooklyn’s skyline and economy."
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Forkstone Renovation / LoCa Studio
- Location: Barcelona, Spain
- Year: 2023
"Reconversion of an old industrial space/parking lot into modern offices, in Espai Serrahima, Barcelona. In Espai Serrahima (a hub of artistic-cultural companies), a few steps from Montjuïc and Plaza España, this old industrial warehouse has been transformed to accommodate new workspaces."
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Transformation of an Industrial Building into an Office Building / Ida
- Location: Barcelona, Spain
- Year: 2023
"The building subject to the intervention is located in the neighborhood of Poblenou in Barcelona, an environment that is undergoing a radical transformation process."
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LOOM Ferretería Pere IV Industrial Building Renovation / Daniel Mòdol
- Location: Barcelona, Spain
- Year: 2022
"The transformation of the 22@ district in the Poblenou neighborhood of Barcelona is an opportunity to promote a new model of the city that pushes Barcelona towards the renewal of its industrial fabrics. Thanks to the innovation, creativity, and design of the new architectures, buildings, and spaces are achieved that generate a more sustainable neighborhood."
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Lao Ding Feng Beijing / Neri&Hu Design and Research Office
- Location: Beijing, China
- Year: 2022
"Today the neighborhood is undergoing a transitional phase, and Neri&Hu was called upon to design the adaptive reuse of an old warehouse building once used for cotton textile production for the main office and retail concept store for the historical Beijing pastry brand called Lao Ding Feng founded in 1911."
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Vilalta Studio Rehabilitation / Vilalta Architects
- Location: Barcelona, Spain
- Year: 2022
"The architectural team of Vilalta Studio, led by Xavier Vilalta, has carried out the integral rehabilitation of an industrial building in Barcelona, transforming it into a self-sufficient and sustainable workspace."
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Ombú Office Building / Foster + Partners
- Location : Madrid, Spain
- Year: 2022
"Ombú - a transformative office building for the Spanish infrastructure and energy company ACCIONA - has officially opened. This retrofit project breathes new life into a historic industrial building in Madrid, creating a sustainable exemplar of building reuse and revitalizing the surrounding area. [...]"
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Cidade BI4ALL Offices / Pedra Líquida
- Location: Lisbon, Portugal
- Year: 2021
"Cidade BI4All is a unique example of rehabilitation and architectural reconversion in a former industrial area of Lisbon (Portugal) - Marvila/Braço de Prata - today in social and urban transformation. At a time when corporate responsibility is so much debated, in a post-carbon and post-COVID-19 pandemic world, this project presents interesting solutions for the rehabilitation of the industrial fabric, without opting for its destruction; and for labor and human relations, enabling both individual work and the sharing of a common daily life. [...]"
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Base4Work Bratislava / Studio Perspektiv
- Location: Bratislava, Slovakia
- Year: 2021
"There are only a few buildings with industrial history left in Bratislava that have managed to adapt to the current needs. One of them is a functionalist building of Jurkovič's Heating Plant, which has been opened to the public after a three-year renovation as a modern coworking center - Base4Work from studio Perspektiv as interior designers. [...]"
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O78! Warehouse Renovation / David Martínez | Tangram Arquitectura + Diseño
- Location: Zaragoza, Spain
- Year: 2020
"78 Seventy Eight is an internationally successful company from Zaragoza that is in the process of expansion. In line with this growth, it requires new offices in accordance with the brand, for which they proposes to refurbish this old industrial building."
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77 Washington Workspace / Worrell Yeung Architecture
- Location: Brooklyn, United States
- Year: 2020
"The project consists of the renovation and redesign of 77 Washington, a six-story, 38,000 square-foot, former masonry factory built in the 1920s, as well as a cluster of four other historic buildings adjacent to the property."
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Xpace Digital Park / JL-Office + Studio QI
- Location: Hangzhou, China
- Year: 2020
"Xpace Digital Park recycles a compound of unused old factories in Xiaoshan District, Hangzhou, China, into a new Startup Campus for Tech companies. The project updates the existing buildings supporting a new identity for the site and transforming it into an urban attractor. [...]"
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Mixed-use in Adaptive Reuse Processes
Adaptive reuse involves an analysis of the pre-existing program, scale, morphology, or surrounding environment of the work to be intervened, among many other factors. While it is possible to find examples such as the reuse of the Tapetfabriken Hotel in Sweden or the conversion of the Damian Restaurant in Los Angeles, United States, which demonstrate how industrial buildings can accommodate new uses, there are industrial complexes or factories that, given their dimensions, characteristics, and/or needs, allow for more than one single use, achieving the coexistence of different users in the same space and the interaction between previously unrelated functions.
Battersea Power Station / WilkinsonEyre
- Location: London, United Kingdom
- Year: 2022
"The designs of new and restored features are consistent with and sympathetic to Sir Giles Gilbert Scott’s masterpiece, with the chimneys and turbine halls remaining the dominant features of the building."
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António Granjo Mixed Use Complex / Fragmentos
- Location: Porto, Portugal
- Year: 2021
"The intervention brought a new life to this old complex composed of three isolated volumes, enhancing urban life and renewing an area of the city currently being transformed."
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La Loza Building Renovation / Alonso + Sosa arquitectos
- Location: Spain
- Year: 2020
"The old industrial building that used to be there looked just like any number of other warehouses of its time, with a concrete structure and wooden window frames. It was built in 1961 and had been closed for 30 years. [...]"
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Aigua de Vilajuïga Complex / TwoBo Arquitectura + Luis Twose Arquitecto
- Location: Vilajuïga, Spain
- Year: 2020
"Aigües de Vilajuïga" is a building complex that cannot be understood without the essence and presence of the water flowing under it. An underground aquifer of carbonated water that has flown non-stop since 1904. The wells and the buildings scattered in the area are the tip of a world that has never seen the light of day. "
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From Industrial Uses to Cultural Uses
While numerous projects in Spain have repurposed industrial warehouses into residential spaces, factory spaces are also capable of hosting cultural uses, taking into account variables such as existing resources, natural conditions, and others during a complex process that integrates and articulates ideas until materializing them and achieving use and appropriation by its inhabitants. Just as in Latin America, numerous warehouses, houses, prisons, mills, and old markets have been recovered and transformed into cultural centers, museums, and galleries, the adaptation to cultural uses can be witnessed from Spain to China, sharing common and diverse objectives and purposes.
The Beams Cultural Center / Broadwick Live
- Location: London, United Kingdom
- Year: 2022
[...] "Housed in a warehouse that was part of the Tate & Lyle factory complex, The Beams is set across an incredible 55,000 sq feet of indoor and outdoor spaces that will act as a testbed for culture in all its forms."
Learn more about this project here.
Pugong Mountain Geology (Lime Mine) Museum / Professor Li Baofeng's Studio of HUST
- Location: Xinyang, China
- Year: 2021
"In order to promote the concept of sustainable development, the People's Government of Xixian County plans to build a museum with the theme of lime kilns. After comparing multiple plans, this plan was finally selected. We integrated the new museum with the existing lime kilns and used the continuous old kiln group as the landmark gate of the geopark. [...]"
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Reform of an Industrial Building for Cultural Facilities "La Nau" / Meritxell Inaraja
- Location: Barberá del Vallés, Spain
- Year: 2020
"The "Nau", a young and creative space in Barberà del Vallès, is the result of the internal reform of an industrial warehouse, which has been transformed into a cultural center. The space promotes artistic creation and diffusion activities, concerts, and recreational and training activities for young people."
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Argo Contemporary Art Museum & Cultural Centre / Ahmadreza Schricker Architecture North - ASA North
- Location: Teherán, Irán
- Year: 2020
"Argo Contemporary Art Museum & Cultural Centre is a former 1920s beer distillery in the heart of Tehran that Ahmadreza Schricker Architecture North (ASA North) converted into a contemporary arts center and is now the new home of the Pejman Foundation, equipped with six distinct gallery spaces & the permanent collection, library, artist residency, event spaces, private studio apartment, art-shop, VIP observation deck, offices and a non-alcoholic bar serving re-issued Argo draft beers."
Learn more about this project here.
* The texts for each project are descriptions provided by the respective authors.
