The new projected Mercado Barceló and its surroundings are, in reality, the sum of various different projects: an urban whole composed of pieces of differing scales and a program that notably changes a dense central area of Madrid.
During the construction period of the main building the construction of a temporary market was necessary to tide over until the new one could be inaugurated. Accordingly, the Mercado Temporal was conceived as a recyclable construction, that despite its temporary nature, is able to induce a new sense of perception into the urban environment. Located in the Plaza del Arquitecto Ribera, over an underground garage, the project evokes in its conception the traditional markets in public squares, formed with independent pavilions on a single level and likely to be put to different purposes. Due to the necessity of housing the many stalls of the old market, the structure is fractured into six volumes with a pentagonal floor, of different heights and dimensions, avoiding in this way the presence of an overlarge building in relation to those surrounding. A lineal, double-height construction on Beneficencia Street houses the loading and unloading zones, storerooms, cold rooms and facilities.
