Half-Moon Pool

RubénValdez description written by Eliot Haworth:

The Paradero Hotel is shaped by the landscape of the South Baja California Desert. It both encloses and opens up to its surroundings through a sheltered central garden and carefully articulated views out over the desert. The landscape and its ecosystem defines the articulation of the space and is a constant frame of reference.

Comprising a series of compact volumes enclosing a central courtyard, the hotel reinterprets the typology of 18th century California Mission architecture built by Spanish Jesuits and Franciscan monks. Following the spatial logic of the monastery, the hotel employs a balance between individual and collective life. Each guest is given their own secluded and self-contained suite with the rest of the sitegiven over to spaces for communal gathering.

Central to the project is an embracing of the surrounding landscape, rather than a reliance on overt luxury. All guest facilities are grouped around the central garden and meals and check-ins take place in the open air. Elsewhere, an elevated swimming pool witha half-moon deck faces out onto the landscape of cactus scrub and mountains.

The hotel is constructed with locally sourced beige concrete and accentuated with custom-made “tornillo” wood detailing, iron metalwork and handwoven textiles. All concrete was mixed directly on site and cast by hand using simple timber formwork, giving the finish a rough tactility and unique character. The carefully calibrated configuration of each building affords passive temperature regulationthroughout the year.

Reached by paths running through the garden,each suite is composed so that its scale and form reveal little of what lies beyond. Inside, a carefully organised sequence of interior and exterior spaces dissolve the limits between the suites and the desert. Each room has its ownuninterrupted view of the landscape, creating a direct and personal interactionbetween guests and their surroundings.

Constructing the Paradero was an exercise in expanding and preserving the surrounding desert ecosystem, rather than extracting from it. As it is situated on former intensive agricultural land, the hotel marked an opportunity for reclaiming and restoring the natural desert ecosystem through the planting of a low water xerophyte garden. The act of construction became a process of positive restoration.

The structure emerges from the landscape and is constantly in dialogue with it. Columns enter directly into bare earth floors and plant life is left to grow freely. Paths meander and attimes the dividing line between the site and the desert is unclear.
The careful contraction and expansion of space modulates the play of light and shadow throughout the hotel. Baffled entrances create a diffused glow of sunlight that spreads gently around corners while moments of alternating shade and exposure are used to define exterior areas.