The former Baobab restaurant in Madrid’s Lavapiés will become a capsule hotel with 288 beds. This was announced this Monday by the Community of Madrid after the General Directorate of Cultural Heritage issued a precautionary measure against the construction on May 22 after failing to detect cultural value that is subject to protection in the property.
From the Urban Planning, Environment and Mobility area of the City Council they have highlighted that this resolution confirms that the building license was properly granted in a property that, as they have recalled, had been vandalized and closed for some time. The City Council provisionally suspended the demolition of numbers 1 and 3 of Cabestreros Street after the mayor, José Luis Martínez-Almeida, reported a complaint filed by the socialist group before the Madrid Prosecutor’s Office “in the face of a possible crime of damage to Madrid’s heritage.”
The project is promoted by the promoter Javier González Herráez and will be developed by the Urbex Arquitectura studio. Since 2020, the intention to convert the space into a tourism business was already known after the purchase of the property for 3.5 million euros by the SmartRental group, one of the companies that manages the most hotels on Gran Vía.
The Municipal Activities Agency authorized the replacement of the building and the implementation of the hostel activity on the property. The file went through the Commission for the Protection of Historical, Artistic and Natural Heritage, which issued a favorable opinion on the demolition in May 2020, considering that there was no element to protect.
Last January, however, the PSOE to denounce the actions and prevent the demolition of the building in order to prevent irreversible damage. The PSOE considers that the two buildings have “high heritage value” and are “witnesses of the 17th century” despite the fact that until now they have not been well preserved. Added to this was what the construction of a new hotel in the area represents for the residents, which, they denounce, will multiply tourist speculation in an increasingly gentrified neighborhood.
“The building has been abandoned for a long time, but the fact that it is a single-story building tells you that it is older than it seems. It was built this way in the 14th, 15th or 16th centuries, for example, and houses like this one, with one floor, there are few left in the city, and more in the center. Its value is not artistic, it is not a palace, but it represents the traditional popular hamlet, the humble, working classes, of which almost nothing remains. [en Madrid]”, explained by phone Antonio Giraldo, spokesperson for Urban Planning of the PSOE, who has been warning for some time that, if the Community did not protect the building, the construction of the hotel would continue.
After the positioning of the regional management, the matter is resolved for the City Council, which leaves the way clear for the construction of the capsule hotel. More like spaceships than traditional hotels, these businesses, characterized by their white walls, neon lights and futuristic architectural forms, actually present rooms just two meters long and one meter wide so that tourists can spend the night in Madrid at more than competitive prices: minimum space, maximum business.
Specifically, according to the website of the development company, this one in Lavapiés will include some more details: shared rooms with bunk beds in cubicles, an independent restaurant on the ground floor, common areas with a cafeteria and reception, a landscaped interior patio and a terrace-viewpoint with a spa area and pool. “The project contemplates a comprehensive transformation of the building, maintaining hotel use, but adapted to a low-cost tourism model with an international vocation,” says the developer.
