![Klinker Apartment by Colombo and Serboli Architecture](https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2019/10/klinker-apartment-interiors-colombo-serboli-architecture-barcelona_dezeen_hero-1-852x479.jpg)
Colour blocking brightens fire-damaged Klinker Apartment in Barcelona
Colombo and Serboli Architecture has used richly-hued paintwork to bring life to the previously charred interior of this apartment in Barcelona.
Klinker Apartment is set inside an art-nouveau building in Barcelona's El Born neighbourhood and serves as a holiday home for a family of four hailing from Coronado, California.
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The mother, an interior designer, had initially planned to renovate the 75 square-metre apartment herself.
However, several months into the construction works, a large fire destroyed a majority of the new elements as well as a number of quirky historic details.
Locally-based Colombo and Serboli Architecture were thus called upon to carry out a budget-friendly renovation that focused on simple, aesthetic alterations – investments made during the first intervention meant the client could no longer afford to make major changes to the apartment's layout.
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"They contacted us one year later from Coronado, having decided to refurbish [the apartment] once again – from a distance," said the practice.
"The challenge was to take the given spaces and make new sense of them, change the meaning and uses without moving walls, to make a new interpretation of the spaces."
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After completely stripping back and repairing surfaces that had been blackened by the flames, the practice has used colour-blocking to delineate different living spaces.
Terracotta-orange paint has been applied across the dropped ceiling, splashback, cabinetry and central breakfast island in the kitchen.
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The same shade of micro cement has then been applied to a strip of flooring that runs directly underneath, contrasting against surrounding patterned tiles that were saved from the previous fit-out.
Orange also covers every surface in the study, which has been created within a narrow recess in the wall.
A bespoke L-shaped desk has been slotted into the corner, directly underneath a new porthole window that lets natural light into the space.
Inhabitants can also switch on a spherical pendant lamp that dangles down from the roof through curved cut-outs in the shelves on the wall.
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Deep-purple paint was selected to coat the ceiling of the living area, where some ornate plasterwork has also been restored. The lower half of the room's walls are painted sandy-beige, forming what the practice describes as an "artificial horizon".
"It visually widens spaces, in an otherwise vertically proportioned property," the practice explained.
A sage-green border has been created around the master bedroom – which even envelops the headboard – and in the children's bedrooms, outlining storage cupboards where toys and other personal possessions can be stowed away.
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A pale grey sofa from Spanish brand Kettal with a mustard-yellow frame, plum-coloured stool seats from Hay and leafy potted plants have also been dotted throughout the home to subtly introduce more colour.
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The Klinker Apartment is one of several projects that Colombo and Serboli Architecture has completed in Barcelona. Back in 2018 it updated a flat to feature a host of colourful elements, including a baby-pink bathroom and floor-to-ceiling blue cabinetry.
Last year also saw the practice overhaul the home of its co-founder, Andrea Serboli. Meant to resemble a cabinet of curiosities, the home was completed with simple white walls against which Serboli could display mementos picked up on his travels.
Photography is by Roberto Ruiz.
Project credits:
Team: Andrea Serboli and Matteo Colombo for Colombo and Serboli Architecture
Contractor: Global Projects
Styling and art direction: CaSA