Zooco, recipient of the 2023 Architecture Masterprize for “Small multidisciplinary interior design firm,” has recently completed the Cantabrian Maritime Museum restaurant project.
Project Name: Restaurant MMC
Studio Name: Zooco Estudio
Situated on Severiano Ballesteros Street in Santander, the Cantabrian Maritime Museum was designed as part of an architectural complex with the Oceanographic Center by Vicente Roig Forner and Ángel Hernández Morales in the late 1970s.
The original structure comprises two interconnected square units under a canopy, constructed with concrete. Its interior spans three floors around a central courtyard covered by a vault of paraboloid membranes. A renovation and extension in 2003 altered the building’s original design, including extending the west façade and terrace roof with a pyramidal aluminum structure.
The project entails creating a new space on the museum’s second floor, accommodating the restaurant and terrace, and addressing existing roof and façade issues. This new volume, consisting of four triangles, complements the original paraboloids, accentuating their raw concrete beauty within the restaurant’s interior.
This geometric addition becomes a recovered element, a relic of the past, and the focal point of the restaurant’s interior. Treated as an artistic element, triangular wooden false ceilings frame it.
