Cerezales Foundation is a private institution aimed at the cultural development of the León region (Spain) through the transfer of knowledge to rural society and ethno-cultural productions. The Foundation is the legacy of its founder, Antonino Fernandez.
Located in Cerezales, a rural village 23km from León, Spain, the Foundation produces exhibitions, concerts, workshops, seminars, projects, festivals, trips, and handles projects related to the study of the regional culture and environment. The activities revolve around art and its registers of the current, the environment, sociology and economics, across multiple formats: visual, acoustic, plastic, electronic... The Foundation’s role as a regional development agency is to operate both as a driving force and coordinator between projects and local and global agents.
The building is free-standing and consists on a system of five pitch-roofed barns – the archetype of rural architecture – located on the top of the plot, level +882.80. The barns are opening to the surrounding gardens on the north and south edges. The barns are built integrally in wood, an artificial carbon trap that addresses the environmental concerns of the institution, and is designed as a carbon-zero building. Programs are sometimes occupying the full volume and sometimes located in a mezzanine. The facilities include an exhibition hall, an auditorium, a public foyer for multiple activities, classrooms, labs, storage for the collections and management offices, for a total floor area of 2,800m2, and a footprint of 1,900m2.
