The Community Development Center (CDC) brings together workshops, multipurpose rooms, a library, an auditorium, and administrative areas around a central garden. Conceived as a habitable sculptural structure, the project is organized around eight monumental concrete walls perforated by semicircular arches.

These walls function simultaneously as structure, enclosure, and the organizing principle of the program. The center’s different spaces are arranged between them, while the openings establish a sequence of visual connections and circulation paths around the interior garden. The repetition of the arches draws on Mexico’s convent architecture, reinterpreting it through a restrained geometry and an exposed concrete structure.

The central garden brings vegetation, shade, and ventilation into the heart of the building. Together with the depth of the concrete walls and the cross-ventilation of the workshops, it helps temper Tabasco’s tropical climate while extending activities into a sheltered open-air space.

The pigmented concrete used throughout the structure echoes the tone of the regional stone found in the main arcade of Jalpa de Méndez’s historic center, establishing a material relationship with the city’s built context.

The project forms part of SEDATU’s Urban Improvement Program in Jalpa de Méndez, developed with the aim of reactivating public life in the city. The CDC forms part of a broader system of interventions that includes the High-Performance Sports Center, the Manuel Vargas Izquierdo Baseball Stadium, and El Campestre Recreational Park, connecting new public, sports, and community spaces within a shared urban strategy.