Parc De L'Afició And Roig Arena Park / Gustavo Marina Paisajistas

Architects: Gustavo Marina Paisajistas
Area: 47,000 m²
Year: 2025
Photography: Milena Villalba
Lead Architects: Gustavo Marina Paisajistas
Landscape Architect: Sofía Escribá
Building Architecture and Planning: ERRE Arquitectura + HOK
Developer: Licampa 1617 SL
Construction: Licampa 1617 SL
Vegetation: More than 200 trees, 13,500 shrubs, more than 100 Mediterranean species
City: Valencia
Country: Spain

Parc de l’Afició and Roig Arena Park establishes a landscape framework around Valencia’s new multipurpose arena, treating its 47,000-square-metre setting as an extension of the public realm rather than a conventional building forecourt. Designed by Gustavo Marina Paisajistas, the intervention combines the 17,000-square-metre Parc de l’Afició with 30,000 square metres of streets, squares and reorganized connections, creating a continuous network between the arena, surrounding facilities and the Quatre Carreres neighbourhood. The landscape is structured through gently varied topography, Mediterranean planting and permeable surfaces that integrate everyday recreation with environmental performance. More than 200 trees, 13,500 shrubs and over 100 Mediterranean species provide shade, seasonal change and habitat, while infiltration wells and permeable paving address stormwater at source. Accessibility is incorporated throughout the public space through controlled gradients, continuous routes, inclusive play areas and distributed resting places. Developed independently while coordinating technically with ERRE Arquitectura, the landscape project extends from conceptual design to construction supervision and positions the exterior as essential urban infrastructure.

Roig arena park / gustavo marina paisajistas

The landscape surrounding Roig Arena addresses a fundamental problem in the design of large contemporary facilities: how to prevent the public realm from becoming residual space once the building has been resolved. In Quatre Carreres, the challenge is particularly pronounced because the arena sits within a territory defined by major destinations including the City of Arts and Sciences, Turia Gardens, L’Alqueria del Basket and Rugby City. Rather than treating these surrounding conditions as isolated edges, Gustavo Marina Paisajistas establishes the exterior as a connective layer capable of mediating between metropolitan infrastructure and everyday pedestrian experience. The resulting landscape gives the district a more continuous spatial structure while allowing the arena to participate in the neighbourhood beyond its event programme.

At the center of this strategy is the Parc de l’Afició, where 17,000 square metres are shaped as an inhabitable topography. Gently undulating meadows create elevation changes that accommodate sitting, resting, playing, exercising, and informal gathering without prescribing a fixed use. The remaining 30,000 square metres extend this public-space system through streets, squares and reorganized routes, linking the arena with adjacent facilities and existing urban movement. Sofía Escribá, project director architect at Gustavo Marina Paisajistas, describes the principal challenge as coordinating the flows of the arena, school, car park and public park while treating them as parts of a continuous exterior system. This approach allows movement and occupation to coexist rather than separating circulation from places of permanence.

Vegetation provides the project with both spatial identity and environmental function. More than 200 trees and 13,500 shrubs are distributed among a palette exceeding 100 Mediterranean species selected in response to Valencia’s climate and water conditions. The resulting layers of canopy, shrubs, perennials and ground cover establish shade while introducing seasonal changes in flowering and foliage. This temporal dimension means the landscape is intended to evolve rather than remain visually static. Increasing plant density can progressively expand shaded areas and moderate surface temperatures, while the diversity of species creates ecological opportunities for insects, birds and other urban wildlife. Nature is therefore embedded in the daily experience of the park as an active system rather than presented solely as visual decoration.

Environmental performance is similarly incorporated into the physical organization of the public realm. Permeable paving enables rainfall to move through the surface rather than relying entirely on conventional drainage, while infiltration wells receive runoff from harder areas and reduce pressure on the wider drainage network during episodes of heavy rain. The use of Mediterranean planting further limits dependence on artificial irrigation by aligning the landscape with local climatic conditions. These measures demonstrate an approach in which ecological infrastructure is integrated into the spatial design itself. Water management, planting, shade and habitat become simultaneous components of a public landscape rather than separate technical systems added after the architectural concept has been established.

The project’s broader significance lies in its ability to reconcile the exceptional demands of an arena with the ordinary rhythms of urban life. Routes with controlled gradients and continuous surfaces support people with different mobility requirements, while inclusive play areas and distributed resting places accommodate a broad range of ages and abilities. The landscape can consequently operate during the concentrated movement of a major event as well as during quieter periods when residents use it simply as a park or route through the district. Its coordination with ERRE Arquitectura maintains a coherent relationship between the arena’s entrances and the surrounding public spaces, while the landscape practice retains its own design language from conceptualization through construction supervision. In this sense, Parc de l’Afició and Roig Arena Park demonstrates the capacity of landscape architecture to function as urban structure, connecting architecture, ecology, accessibility and public life within a single continuous field.