You may think piña coladas and sunburnt Brits before world-class architecture; but Tenerife is an island with considerably more strings to its bow than just Sunday roasts in the sun. With the Tenerife Espacio de las Artes and the Plaza de España’s beautiful artificial lake having been designed by iconic Swiss architects Herzog & de Meuron, and Santiago Calatrava Valls’ Auditorio de Tenerife joining sculptures from the likes of Joan Miró and Henry Moore, that have lined the streets since an exhibition in 1973; Santa Cruz de Tenerife – home of the world’s second largest carnival – is a surprising oasis of international sophistication in the much maligned Canaries. This new arts centre, courtesy of local studio gpy arquitectos, is just another addition to that architectural landscape. For concrete fetishists like ourselves it’s a veritable hunk of eye-candy, but for locals it offers a unique urban arts platform where performances can take place with the building itself – the ramps, the platforms, the landings – acting as the stage…
Photograph: Teresa Arozena
Photograph: Manuel Medina
Photograph: Joaquín Ponce de eón
Photograph: Joaquín Ponce de eón
Photograph: Efraín Pintos
Photograph: Miguel de Guzmán
