The memorial project in El Salado (Bolívar / Colombia) seeks to materialize a shared sentiment of a community and to establish a new beginning. It commemorates both a tragic historical event, the Salado massacre of February 2000, and a heroic return to restore the life and dignity of a place. A solid concrete structure raised on slender metal columns covers a central space, enclosed by a spiral shaped wall that arranges a journey of memories. The simplicity in terms of form and materiality offers a place of respect and unity, honoring those who can no longer participate in the realization of the community´s future. Half museum and half monument, the memorial is imagined as a new place of civic culture, inserted in an area of natural landmarks and public buildings within the central part of El Salado. The participatory design process behind the project, to be further consolidated with the realization of the memorial, already initiated the larger purpose of the project: the construction of a collective memory.