Auditorio de Tenerife

Calatrava gave Tenerife's regional government a single dramatic image for the price of a concert hall: a white concrete arch that appears to float free above the auditorium roof, touching down at only two points, curving up to 58 metres and cantilevering out over open air at its tip as if unsupported. It shelters nothing — the arch carries no structural load from the hall below, which is itself a separate shell wrapping the 1,616-seat Symphony Hall and a smaller 422-seat Chamber Hall, both faced in broken white ceramic tile (trencadís) in a nod to Gaudí. Ground was broken in 1997 and the building, named for the Canarian premier Adán Martín after his 2003 death, opened on 26 September 2003. It has become the civic emblem of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, reproduced on a 2008 postage stamp and a 2011 five-euro coin, and hosts the Canary Islands' main symphony orchestra alongside opera, jazz and conference use.