Hotel Porta Fira won the 2010 Emporis architecture prize, ahead of the Burj Khalifa. At 110 meters-high, the tower is one of the tallest buildings in Barcelona and a new icon for its skyline.

Architecture

The avant-garde building in red is located in the town of L'Hospitalet de Llobregat. The design of the Porta Fira Hotel Ito was inspired by the organic form of a lotus flower.

The hotel was conceived as a distorted cylinder in which all rooms will have excellent views to the city. The building also contains commercial areas at the ground level and a panoramic restaurant in the top floor. One of the most interesting aspects of the project is the facade made of a system of red metal tubes placed at a certain inclination depending on solar exposure and orientation.

The facade is composed of a double skin on the inner wall which consists of a sealed enclosure with a curtain wall system, while the outer wall is made independently, using sections of circular tubes. The characteristic red adapts to the formal geometry of the tower.