"A shopping mall that could only be traversed by car, without getting out of the vehicle and without walking. Without abandoning the steering wheel, lest progress escape through the back door. Thus, El Helicoide was conceived as a single, continuous movement. A ramp. A spiral path that encircled the Tarpeian Rock and rose above Caracas, transforming consumption into a journey and the incline into a substitute for urban strolling."
"Venezuela in the 1950s. With dictator Marcos Perez Jimenez at the helm, the country was overflowing with gasoline, dollars, and a very specific kind of civic silence that could be mistaken for political stability. Oil permeated everything. There was money, there was speed, and with both, an almost sweaty faith in the idea that the future was guaranteed and that any attempt at objection would be drowned out by pressing the gas pedal. Literally."
El Helicoide originated in 1950s Venezuela as an ambitious, system-minded architectural project rooted in an oil-fueled economy and authoritarian stability. The design prioritized automobile circulation, presenting a shopping mall that could be traversed without leaving the car, organized as a single continuous ramp and spiral around the hillside. The program included hundreds of shops, eight cinemas, a five-star hotel, a private club, a performance hall, and a helipad, all crowned by a geodesic dome intended to reflect tropical light back to the city as an abstract symbol. Four kilometers of asphalt spiraled around the Tarpeian Rock, converting consumption into a vehicular journey.
Read at english.elpais.com
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