Desert City

Desert City is an over 16,000 sqm multi-purpose centre located in San Sebastián de los Reyes, Spain, designed by Jacobo García-Germán. It houses an experimental botanical garden of cacti and other xerophytes, the first biotechnological nursery specialising in xeriscaping, with R+D facilities, a laboratory and terrace-vantage points, among other element.

  A large longitudinal construction, lying parallel to the road, is symmetrically arranged as a garden-cloister, where visitors are received. On the other hand, the lightness of the nursery roof was made possible thanks to a tensegrity-type structure of traction- tensed cables, which is unique in Spain. Indeed, the highly sophisticated roof, built by applying state-of-the-art technology, is both an attraction in its own right and a token of Desert City’s commitment to innovation and the imagination.

The Botanical Garden is unique in the way it combines the aesthetic elements of natural environments in the planet’s arid and semi-arid areas. Here visitors may contemplate an entire gamut of exhibits ranging from cacti to native Mediterranean-climate plants such as lavender and rosemary. The garden is divided into different sections that, metaphorically, evoke all the world’s deserts.

Desert City, San Sebastián de los Reyes, Madrid
Program: botanical garden
Architect: Garciagerman Arquitectos – Jacobo García-Germán
Design team: Jacobo García-Germán, Marta García Jiménez, Laura Carrero, Miguel López, Raquel Díaz de la Campa, Lidia de Lucas, Martha Sosa Dias, Andrea Gutierrez, Victoria Álvarez, Margot Roset, Paula Lizcano, Christina Christofidou, Marta Roldán, Celia Sánchez Ylla
Strategy and management: Antonio Usero
Quantity surveyor: Mario García
Structural engineering: Felipe F. Sanz/Consult-E
Installations: Úrculo Ingenieros
Landscape: Patricia Gammichia
Mobility projects: Ángel Sampedro
Site manager: Alberto Charlez
Area: 16,000 sqm
Completion: 2017