Agricultural Temples in the Iberian Landscape, Larders from the Past

Abstract

The Galician hórreo is a traditional rural building of Northern Spain used for desiccation and conservation of cereal grains. This detached building provides natural ventilation, an unfavourable environment for biotic agents such as fungi and insects, and prevents the access of other animals, such as rodents. The essential typology of the Galician hórreo emerged historically as a result of many different cultures interacting with changing harvesting techniques related to growing cycles. Types are those persistent architectural elements that give form to the collective life of the city. This thesis examines the significance of the ‘hórreo’ typology in the context of Aldo Rossi’s advocacy of ‘type’ as a persistent architectural element that gives form to the collective life of a city or region and raising the issue of permanence in architecture within the fluid tides of history. The hórreo is perceived as an irreducible element encoded within the historical permanence of the regions of Galicia and Asturias. The thesis proposes an architecture that embodies time and memory in a world where space and time become increasingly compressed. In recognizing the limitations of typology in an era of accelerated experience, the thesis argues for its relevance by creating an architecture that bridges different eras and time periods for a culture like Galicia, that still remembers.