PW Cruz Grande Museum of Memory & Wharf | Chungungo, Chile

Personal project initiates an interest in reactivating an abandoned monumental vestige with heritage qualities. The abandoned and precarious condition of the docks presented an opportunity of restoration into a new program that would meet the modern needs of local fishermen and families of miners.

The Dock of Cruz Grande, once a mining port that enjoyed economic prosperity, is now a cove for fishermen at the end of a little known touristic route. With groups that inhabit the dock identified, I journeyed on to promote a new local productive boom (fishermen wharf) and strengthen the culture and historic identity of the region (visitor’s center and museum). 

The Interpretation Center and Museum of El Tofo Mine aims to form a permanent home for the Tofo mine archive, photographs and archive collection. It will make this archive public, tactile and richly experiential.

The new structure is projected over the former foundations of the steel mine dock (removed in 1976) and aims to ignite curiosity, encourage discovery, promote a once forgotten history and provide much needed economic sustenance for the region.

*this project won the “Pontificia Universidad Católica Best Project of the Generation 2016” Award