My husband and I have been living by the woods since a little bit more than a year, have I ever mentioned that here? It can be miraculously beautiful and charming I have to admit, like living in a different epoch, so long as one is willing to pay attention to all the changes happening throughout the year, as seasons pass. Mostly visual changes, but also hearing and smell ones, not to mention of course the taste, which is at its peak during summer with all the berries the forest has to offer.
However, the forest I’m sharing with you here today is not one that changes as seasons alter. It is the same all year long, but equally magnificent day after day in its gorgeous conception. This marvelous, enormous dining room you are seeing here, is the cafeteria area in the Cidade da Cultura de Galicia, designed by Spanish architects Estudio Nomada.
Their purpose was to create a conceptual forest to evoke a communal spirit of local summer festivals, featuring long tables shaded by the surrounding trees.
The feet of the tables extend upward and become abstracted tree forms creating the illusion that one is part of an illustrated outdoor scenery. Don’t you just love the view of the forest cafeteria through the unevenly shaped oval like opening? The branches high above the tables filling the void of the tall space… I would so love to be sat there sipping a coffee, perhaps browsing through a favorite magazine or entering a conversation with others around me. The space is somehow fairy tale like, yet so modern and urban.
and last but not least at all, the wooden forest structure gets all lightened up by the colorful tiles on the long counter. They in fact are a nod to the Galician folk culture and to me personally, the whole place is a new motivator to visit a new city in Spain, after so many other numerous ones. Can’t wait!
Photography: Hector Santos-Diez
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