Architects: LANZA Atelier Year: 2015 Photography: Camila Cossio Producers: Baumracks, Cementos Moctezuma Products: Cinder blocks, steel sheet walls painted white, glass, vegetation, bamboo Location: Ecatepec de Morelos Nation: Mexico
The task by LANZA Atelier develops a series of kiosks and public toilet modules along a bike track in Ecatepec, Estado de México, conceived as a low-cost technique for enhancing civic facilities within a dense and underserved urban context. Rather than working as separated service points, the intervention develops a distributed system of small public spaces that jointly support motion, rest, and social interaction. The design is driven by principles of modularity, permeability, and ecological combination, utilizing cost-effective materials such as concrete blocks and steel sheet to accomplish resilience and performance. Spatial setups integrate courtyards, voids, and planted areas that manage light, ventilation, and temperature level, while plants is embedded into the architectural logic to develop shaded and more comfy microclimates. Through repeating and variation, the job forms a continuous infrastructural landscape that redefines basic public amenities as spatial and environmental devices within the metropolitan material.
As architects, we should be able to develop less and easier.
Interview with Isabel Abascal and Alessandro Arienzo of LANZA atelier
Commissioned as part of infrastructure works along Av. Central in Ecatepec, the task reframes vital public features as an integrated system within the bicycle corridor. LANZA Atelier approaches kiosks and toilets not as separated things, however as interconnected aspects that add to a broader spatial and social structure along the path.
Kiosks and Public 
Toilets/ LANZA Atelier 20 Kiosks and Public Toilets/ LANZA Atelier 21 Kiosks and Public Toilets/ LANZA Atelier 22 The intervention is organized through repeating, including three toilet modules and thirteen sets of kiosks dispersed along the bicycle track. This plan establishes a constant rhythm that accompanies movement while guaranteeing accessibility at routine intervals. Each system participates in a constant field condition, reinforcing the understanding of a combined infrastructural system. Product strategy is grounded in economy and clarity, using concrete blocks and painted steel sheet as main building and construction components. These options enable efficient assembly while defining a restrained architectural expression. Within this simpleness, spatial richness emerges through the mindful positioning of openings, spaces, and incorporated landscape functions. Kiosks are configured around main courtyards, typically anchored by palm trees, with seating and table elements embedded straight into the blockwork. This plan promotes casual occupation and social interaction, changing the structures into shaded gathering points. In the toilet modules, bamboo elements present visual permeability while arranging spaces, and shared sinks are positioned centrally to motivate cumulative usage. 
Across both typologies, the job dissolves conventional boundaries between exterior and interior, permitting air, light, and plants to penetrate the architecture. This spatial ambiguity supports varied patterns of use and enhances the job’s role as a flexible civic framework, where modest architectural means produce a constant and active public landscape.
