This is Actually a Building
Their website describes it as “the jewel in the crown of the Marriot International hotel chain.” If that’s the case, it’s an unusual jewel, for sure.
Most gems have straight edges and defined facets. This bit of avant garde architecture is more like a huge titanium Christmas bow or a mass of swirling metallic waves crashing onto a shore in some remote tropical paradise.
The building, in fact, is a hotel that is nowhere near water! The Hotel Marqués de Riscal is located in the heart of the Basque country of north-central Spain and is the most extravagant element of what is known as the “City of Wine” in the medieval town of Elciego, La Rioja.
The City of Wine complex includes the modern and historical wine cellars, offices of the international vintager, the hotel, and the vineyards with all the out-buildings associated with a large business like this.
The vineyard wins awards for its wines, not necessarily for its hotel, but if you are into avant garde architecture, it’s the place to be.
The 61-room hotel features a world class restaurant and—get this—a “Vinoterápia” spa. Translated…if you’re feeling the need for some serious wine therapy this Advent, you now know the place to see and be seen by all the rich and famous!
Quick History
The minor Spanish nobleman, the VIth Marquis of Riscal, must have been a sharp guy. He was a forward thinker anyway. In 1858, he planted some of the 900 acres of his massive estate with grapevines with the intent of bottling and selling them, which he began to do four years later.
He may not have known it at the time, but he created an empire. (The Spanish are good at that.) Now, the company that owns the winery is called, appropriately, the Heirs of the Marqués de Riscal, and they sell premium wines in over 100 countries of the world. Wow.
The Architecture
It may not surprise you that the same architect who designed the beehive-like Guggenheim Museum in New York City also designed this Marriot hotel.
His name is Frank O. Gehry (b. 1929), and if you didn’t already guess, he is a modernist, actually a surrealist, architect as can be gathered from some of his other creations.
I love that last one. It’s actually a center for brain health. Oh my goodness!
If you suffer from vertigo, I’d advise you to avoid workspaces like these. I can’t personally imagine how anyone could work in buildings of this style, but Mr. Gehry didn’t ask my opinion on the matter.
I don’t propose these projects as items of beauty but rather as objects of fascination and wonder. They are marvels of architecture in their own way. These fluid-florid designs are actually works of steel, concrete, glass, and titanium!
That’s the amazing window into beauty: the sheer wonder that structures like this could even be built.
Oh, and by the way: the three colors of the hotel roof are symbolic too. The pink represents the red and rose wines the vineyard produces; the gold symbolizes the tiny gold braided sheath that covers most of the Riscal bottles (their signature); the silver imitates the foil cap on each bottle.
Here’s a link to the vineyard’s extremely professional website (English version) if you want to check them out in more detail.
I’m not sure if the old Marqués de Riscal would have a positive feeling for the hotel design that’s on his property, but he sure would be happy to know that the vineyard he planted 165 years ago now produces 12 million bottles of wine annually. Again, wow!
----------
Photo Credits: Via Wikimedia Commons: Disney Concert Hall in LA; Museum of Pop Culture in Seattle; Cleveland Clinic in Las Vegas; images of Hotel (Marriot.com and Enterwine.com).