Refurbished Holiday Apartment by Colombo and Serboli Architecture // Barcelona.

Colombo and Serboli Architecture have transformed a neglected and previously poorly planned interior into an attractive holiday home. The apartment is located on the sixth floor of an art nouveau building in Barcelona, Spain. The space had to be completely replanned and all existing partition were demolished. Faced with a tight budget, clever solutions were required to create an attractive, contemporary holiday atmosphere.

The chosen palette of materials includes a micro-cement light grey matt floor, natural timber, and a dash of a different colour for each bathroom, and two shades in the corridor. The terrace that had been closed in years ago has now been opened and extended towards the interior, by treating part of the indoor space as outdoor. On the opposite side, a bar table extends to the outside through the newly opened arc window, to form an outdoor dining table.

Thin-white-rod structures are one of the themes carried through the whole project. They were custom made and used to form the terrace table and bar, the kitchen island, the entrance screen, and all the bathrooms.

Large timber pivoting door spins to give access to the night-time area. When the door is closed, the teal colour of the walls and ceiling appears framing the timber. The communal bathroom, tiled with blue ceramics and a bright yellow grout, opens onto a small light-well patio that’s been retrieved and filled with plants, with a shower window overlooking the green. The four double bedrooms are simple and basic, but still detailed. Two layers of floor-to-ceiling curtains soften the matt cement floors of the apartment. Stools painted with shades of the teal like the central corridor are used as bedside tables.

In two of the three rooms the bathrooms open onto the space to reveal a dash of coloured ceramic tiles in pink, yellow or light green – each one grouted with a contrasting colour. On walls above the beds hang beautiful graphics by Dutch artist Sigrid Calon, continuing the language of the rest of the apartment.

[Images courtesy of Colombo and Serboli Architecture. Photography by Roberto Ruiz.]