Ricardo Legorreta

How would you define [Legorreta’s] architectural accomplishments for the two projects … related to culture and climate.

Between the two projects, I think the Camino Real Hotel is significantly more responsive to its environmental context. The hotel is an interesting contrast to me – almost a contradiction – in that it so beautifully fits into the environment yet at the same time stands out as a monument. The way the hotel molds to the existing topography of the site, and the decision to leave the beach untouched, goes a long way in making the rather large hotel feel unimposing and respectful to its site. On the other hand, Legorreta’s choice of such a bold red prevents the structure from disappearing into the landscape the way it might if more organic materials were used. This is a daring choice, but I believe it works exactly as it should.

This is obviously a very difficult balance to achieve in architecture and I applaud Legorreta for succeeding in that.

The Solana project I think is less successful in being context responsive. It’s not entirely apparent from the description or photos, but it looks to me like the site doesn’t give as much to respond to as the Camino Real site. So perhaps that is an unavoidable reason for the disconnect I see.  I think the project is striking in its monumentality – both in mass and color. The pure masses and bold colors featured throughout are very reminiscent of Barragan, almost to the point of mimicry. The project is interesting, and beautiful, and definitely achieves IBM’s goal of making a non-typical office park. However, compared to the Camino Real Hotel I think it falls far short of perfection.