In 2011, the rehabilitation works of the Saladino Cortizo School in Vigo, one of the most significant pieces of Galician architectural modernity, were completed.
As a result of this experience, considering a series of aspects related to this heritage and its preservation is proposed based on reflecting on the paradoxes that make it unique. Among them is the difficulty of identifying, in these proposals, values traditionally intrinsic to the heritage definition, such as the value of antiquity, or of recognizing the will of non-permanence with
which this architecture is born.
From the outset, a distance is established considering other buildings of the modern movement that are works of reference and, as such, have
been monumentalized and musealified. This deals with another heritage, broad and diverse, ordinary, which requires the definition of intervention criteria that, although specific
in each case, share a series of keys. First, the defining role of technology poses a continuous friction between the need to update buildings to current sustainability standards and the preservation of their materiality.
Secondly, the functionalist determination of the original proposals clashes with the need for greater flexibility in the spaces and the uses they accommodate, adding to the expansion of the original programs.
On the other hand, values other than those linked to functionality are also important, such as the dynamics of users and inhabitants, which testify to the life of these buildings, as an intangible heritage value. Finally, the urgency of specific
training is claimed, both from academic and professional research, as well as social dissemination, which incorporates citizens into the process of protection and recovery of these community values. All this complexity converges in the architectural project, as an instrument of action on which falls the responsibility of enhancing this heritage through strategies that combine knowledge and creativity.