Chapel in Brihuega

About this place

Brihuega, a small walled town in Guadalajara known for its lavender fields and medieval fabric, is home to a modest 16th-century chapel that architect Adam Bresnick restored and adapted in 2012 into a new kind of civic space. Rather than freezing the building as a static monument, the project reimagines it as a working multi-purpose venue — used for weddings, concerts, exhibitions, and even yoga retreats. The restoration is deliberately restrained: original stone walls and the chapel's proportions are preserved and cleaned, while modern interventions — a new lighting scheme, updated flooring, and discreet mechanical systems — are kept legible but unobtrusive, so the historic fabric always reads as primary. Daylight floods through existing openings, and at night, careful artificial lighting turns the stone interior warm and golden, an effect much prized by the events now held inside. The project is a small-scale but instructive example of adaptive reuse in rural Spain: instead of allowing a modest historic building to fall into disrepair or become an inert museum piece, the architect gave it an active, revenue-generating second life that keeps the building maintained and the town's built heritage relevant to contemporary use. It is an easy stop for anyone passing through this part of Castilla-La Mancha, best combined with a walk through Brihuega's old town and its famous lavender fields in July.