The book starts with a small drawing where José María García de Paredes superposes the perimeters – on plan – of some of his churches, as if one project could explain the shape of others through a series of almost intangible geometrical relationships.

Geometry is a base and generator of form in the architect’s work. Many of the projects chosen for the publication illustrate this, and show the form/function bond. We find a good example in the floor plans of the Málaga and Almendrales churches, though it is in the section drawings that the translation is best appreciated.

The monograph is divided into acts, each starring a certain author. Marchán, Moneo, Sobejano, Tuñón, Navarro Baldeweg, Manuel García de Paredes, Sert, Giancarlo De Carlo, Juan Domingo Santos, Elisa Valero, Pérez Escolano, Ignacio García Pedrosa, and his daughter Ángela break down the architecture and thought of García de Paredes.

We are led from his beginnings at the Madrid School and the Academy of Spain in Rome to his practice working out of the Bretón de los Herreros studio. Each act is independent of the rest, giving readers a specific view of a project or stage. But the partial views are reinforced in the overall narrative through complex links.

The book lends itself to many readings and proof of this are the parallel indexes, of texts and of buildings, that interweave through drawings and photographs selected by the editor, who like a ‘turjuman’ mixes up and connects stories with works.