Wind garden designed to reduce Madrid's sizzling temperatures

Madrid is building a giant wind garden which it’s hoped will reduce city temperatures by 4 degrees. Urban design and landscape architecture office West 8 and local architecture firm Porras Guadiana won an international design competition to build the 14.5 hectare park which should be open by 2025.

The announcement of the park comes as the country grapples with record sizzling temperatures in successive summers. West 8 says its design draws on ancient Middle Eastern air conditioning techniques, using the wind garden to capture the breeze and disperse it around the park and surrounding streets. 

The cooling effect will come from a wind garden at the centre of the park. Image: West 8

The garden will feature a spiral structure covered by vegetation such as mosses and ferns to produce its own microclimate. “This large vertical garden will rise above the height of the treetops to capture the high breezes and direct them through its green envelope, thus reducing the ambient temperature inside and creating a cool space that it will become the main meeting point of the park”, says West 8 director, Adriaan Gueze.  

West 8’s design incorporates the layout of the decades-existing train tracks of Chamartín Station to propose a series of flowing lines which run longitudinally through the park. In addition, the creation of the central park will allow the surrounding neighbourhoods to be united, closing a historic gap within the north of the city of Madrid, West 8 says.

This large vertical garden will rise above the height of the treetops to capture the high breezes and direct them through its green envelope. Image: West 8

As well as rain gardens and plenty of green space the park will incorporate kiosks, restaurant terraces, pavilions, food trucks and sports areas. And it’ll have sensory environments of light and sound along the park network, which will change throughout the year. 

The project is part of Madrid Nuevo Norte, an urban transformation project in the north of the Spanish capital, which officials have branded one of the most significant projects in Europe in terms of improving quality of life and creating a more efficient, sustainable and prosperous city.