Aguilar de la Frontera is a small town in the province of Cordoba, in the South of Spain. The plot for its new Health Center is located in a rather peripheral site, surrounded by contrasting conditions. One of its long sides faces a somehow industrial street with several warehouses near the site. The other long side, however, lies on an old retaining wall and overlooks a nice landscape of vineyards and olive groves. One of its short sides faces a small square also enjoying the countryside scene.

The building for the Health Centre reacts to this contrasting environment displaying a blind façade to the industrial street and a series of perpendicular wings that can be seen over the old wall like three Acropoli-like pavilions. The main entrance faces the square through a deep porch. At the level of the ground floor, the long façade to the street turns inwards to lead the pedestrian coming from the town centre to the porch.

The internal layout is organized by a main axis that, beginning in the porch, holds a sequence in with the courtyards and the pavilions containing the surgeries alternate. None of the surgeries opens either to the street or to the square, but they use the linear courtyards in between the pavilions to be illuminated and ventilated. Visually connecting both floors, and to enhance the public appearance of the main axis, some voids are introduced in front of the courtyards.

In these courtyards, the building envelope is composed by a curtain wall of flat pillars, acting as brise soleils, when it goes along the waiting galleries. When related to the surgeries, the envelope has two long linear windows protected by mobile louvres. Given how extreme is the summer in Aguilar, the courtyards are provided with deciduous trees and removable awnings on top.

The Health Centre has a 24-hours emergency service which and independent entry.

The main construction features of the building are the pile foundations, the structure with steel columns and concrete slabs and the use of white stucco and local “Molinaza” stone on the façade. This stone also covers the square and the porch floor.