Based in the neighborhood of Tetuán north of the city center, Paisaje Tetuán represents a union of projects and sites aimed at beautifying the environs, providing opportunities for community engagement, and reclaiming spaces around the neighborhood. Actually an initiative born out of the municipality to improve the landscape of the neighborhood, in partnership with Intermediae (an experimental social and cultural programming laboratory supported by Madrid’s city council), it manifested in multiple phases of projects creating huertos urbanos, plazas, and urban art. This multi-pronged approach has enabled Paisaje Tetuán to build relationships with multiple other groups, to explore a variety of interventions, and to provide a means for community members to shape their neighborhood.
Paisaje Tetuan has two huertos in the neighborhood - La Huerta de Tetuan and Ganando Metros. They have partnered with numerous groups of artists and architects to make innovative use of the space - creating a photo project with artist collaborative Moenia and built structures that meet needs of gardeners while providing programming flexibility with Basurama and Zuloark. At La Huerta de Tetuan, for example, stadium-style seating has been created out of wooden pallets and arranged to face a portion of a wall painted white to project movies. Meanwhile, at Ganando Metros, the walled off space has large lettering painted on the outside telling passers-by what the space is and welcoming in visitors .
Scattered across Tetuan are numerous murals and functional sculptures that are part of the Paisaje Tetuan initiative and designed to elicit engagement and interest from residents. A plaza they designed in collaboration with collectives like Pez Arquitectos and Estudio Montes features lines of poetry from a local poet while a canopy provides much needed shade from the sun.
Paisaje Tetuan has been conducted in multiple stages to build sustainably and respond to community needs, interests, and concerns and is serving as a model pilot for Intermediae. However, their first stage focused on building and their second on engaging the community, which led to some problems with community not feeling ownership over the spaces. As a pilot, they're learning from their mistakes though as Intermediae starts their next initiative - Paisaje Sur. To the south of the city center, this initiative is being modeled after Paisaje Tetuan. Their projects include two huertos and an outdoor movie theater and they have collaborated with many of the same expert collectives to create their interventions.
