McKay Building

Santa Cruz de Tenerife · Category: Architecture · Subcategory: Civil architecture · Year: 1932 · Authors: Miguel Martín-Fernández de la Torre

Multi-family residential building designed in March 1932 by the Gran Canarian architect Miguel Martín Fernández de la Torre for the developer Guillermo McKay. The plot where it was built was then on the northern outskirts of the city, right at the end of San Francisco and La Marina streets, overlooking the harbour bay. 

The construction, with three floors and two dwellings per floor, was conceived under the typological canons of rationalist architecture, a true avant-garde at that time.

The façade is divided into two vertical planes separated on the ground floor by an access staircase, and above by the separation of the continuous balconies enclosed by tubular railings. The lower part of the first section features a roughcast finish, giving way then to the general cladding. The windows, at the time, combined glass with metal fittings and profiles, which gave the whole ensemble a curious sensation.

Three canopies, a characteristic element of Miguel Martín's architecture, unfold on its front: one, of short length, covers the entrance; another runs along the entire façade covering the highest balcony; and the third is found as a crowning element raised on stilts on the building's roof.

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