Episode #45

Jorge Otero-Pailos, Professor and Director of the Historic Preservation program at Columbia GSAPP speaks with Antonio Cruz, co-founder of Cruz y Ortiz Arquitectos. Cruz delivered the Paul S. Byard Memorial Lecture at the school on on February 19.

They discuss Cruz y Ortiz’s renovation of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and the firm’s philosophy of making contemporary adaptations that respect and incorporate the existing structures. With the expansion of the ‘Wanda Metropolitano’ Football Stadium in Madrid, also known as La Peineta, they had the opportunity to revisit their own iconic structure of 1989.

“The problem is to do things in the right way … The criteria is if we are able to maintain the value of the initial building. We have to not only restore the building but introduce something of our moment, the moment that we live in.”
—Antonio Cruz

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