During the decade of the fifties in Spain, avant-garde movements began to infiltrate the architectural profession, although an attitude of compromise continued to predominate, with the principles of modernity more or less adapted to local traditions.
Antonio Bonet’s career as an architect had precocious beginnings, as he participated in the Athens CIAM while still a student and was an active member of the GATEPAC. Later, while working with Le Corbusier at Rue de Sevres, he cooperated in the build
Spain’s joining the UN in 1950 opened its doors to a certain degree, bringing about a gradual acceptance of avant-garde currents on the part of architects and members of the educated classes. A reflection of this new climate was the awarding of the 1
A catalyst of the Catalan avant-garde was the foundation in 1951 of Grupo R, which was propitiated by the visits of Bruno Zevi and Alvar Aalto to Barcelona, and partly summed up the prewar ideals of the GATEPAC. As a founding member and ideologist of
For spain of the mid-fifties, the ‘Poblados Dirigidos ' constituted a brilliant architectural and social experiment which a group of young professionals dedicated themselves to undertaking, backed by efficient administrators and stimulated by popular
In the Balearic Isles, the meeting of foreign influences with an architecture of strong autochthonous roots generally produced eclectic or merely mimetic results. Erwin Broner’s coherent synthesis of tradition and the avant-garde is an isolated case.
Against some excessively orthodox and reductionist interpretations of International Style was the stand of Fernando Higueras, who was aware of the need to broaden the architectural language. This was evident in his 1960 project for artists' apartment
After a brief informalist phase represented by the Ugalde House - with its organic curves and fragmented walls - Coderch embarked on a stylistic transition which included the momentary mountain incursion of the Olano House (1957) at Comillas and the
Despite the relative geographic isolation of his professional activity, circumscribed within the area surrounding Vigo s estuary, Bar Boo ’s work left a clear mark on the next generation of Galician architects. Fascinated by regulatory schemes and th
The entire lifework of Luis Peña Gauchegui could be understood in terms of the postulates of ‘critical regionalism’, the current spearheaded - among others - by the British critic Kenneth Frampton, who preconizes that local traditions be tied to the
For Carvajal, the Spanish Pavilion at the 1963 World's Fair in New York meant prolonged contact with American architecture, in particular with 'cubist expressionism', which he felt especially attracted to. The leading mentor of this movement was Paul
The fortunate convergence of a broad program, a generous budget and a cultivated client — Juan Huarte, a Maecenas and real estate promoter - made it possible to carry out an audacious proposal for a courtyard-house that was quickly to become a reside
I would like to have a house that resembles me (in beauty); a house that reflects my humanity.” This phrase, by Ernesto N. Rogers, summarizes the preoccupations concerning the one-family residence that emerge in the immediate postwar period, in the h
At the end of the sixties, the exhaustion of the postwar period gave way to an intellectual renewal that was expressed in a deep change in customs, social movements and artistic impulses. In architecture, the Modern Movement became a mannerist expres
After leaving Australia in 1966, Utzon decided to build a getaway where he could spend time with his family, and in Mallorca he found the ideal place. However, as time went by Can Lis became, as happened with his other few works, a pilgrimage site fo
The professional formation of José Antonio Corrales belongs to the years when materials and construction patents were scarce. His ambition to build Modern architecture in the heyday of ‘Escorial Style’ obliged him, as it did Sota or his colleague Mol
The emotion involved in building one’s own house often results in a made-to-order sort of project wherein every object and function is assigned a specific place. But a building designed in this manner in the long run proves too rigid to accommodate v
In the mid-seventies, after a long stint in the United States, Juan Navarro Baldeweg unveiled a multifaceted profile: as an artist, with simultaneous shows in Madrid and Barcelona; as an architect, winning the competition for a 'House for an Intersec
According to certain critics, in a large portion of contemporary Spanish architecture the dialogue between the solid and the fragile has become a traditional formal solution for projects. Within the culture of the agora, which is to say in Mediterran
Since its founding in 1954, MBM has produced a wide repertory of work related to housing. The firm has been a leader in Barcelona, due to both the didactic nature of their work at large and the fact that in the course of forty years a good number of
Thos house was to be built by Erwin Broner, a lively, bohemian German architect and painter who found in Ibiza his garden of the Hesperides and dotted the with white cubist boxes, descendants of a Mediterranean Le Corbusier and of those pioneers of m
At an uncertain moment of history, the transition from the sixties to the seventies, Spain witnessed an awakening of its peripheral areas. For architecture it was a time to test diverse approaches, which ranged from Italian contextualism to British b
The architecture of Elias Torres and Jose' Antonio Martínez Lapeña keeps itself on the brinks of theory or method, escaping the corset and moving freely outside center page. If they had to work over a modular scheme, they would choose the millimeter
Modern architecture has at times interpreted the house as a simulation of outdoor life. Architects have fed on personal fantasies and followed their instincts when immersing inhabitable metaphors in nature, and the Villa Mai re a and Fallingwater are
At the client’s insistence on absolute independence, it was decided that the solution would be an enclosed space, a hortus conclusus. The house, bordered by four walls rising 3.5 meters, is an 18x18-meter square divided into three equal parts. Only t
With the seventies arrived a profound crisis, which in Spain proved to be not only economic but also political, coinciding with the transition between regimes. The crisis provoked many dismissals, and one of the least necessary and perhaps least just
Built for he painter Gordillo s exclusively residential use, this house in the Madrid area follows the basic concept of an elemental box, using conventional layout and composition schemes, while it was the program’s dialogue with the landscape and to
Though designed as an extension of another dwelling on the lot that was built way back in the forties, this house in Vallvidriera presents itself as an isolated volume, separated from the old construction by an exterior staircase. Among the condition
The climate and rural architecture of the region of Galicia were the principal references in the designing of this dwelling for a young married couple. Measuring slightly more than a hectare, the lot is situated in the town of Ames, not far from the
The character of this dwelling is much determined by the lot’s irregular shape and its steep northward slope, which offers privileged views of the mountainous surroundings. The implantation of the building has been conditioned by a desire to respond
Situated between Carrer Actor Morano and the funicular line, in the Vallvidriera area of Barcelona, is the irregularly shaped lot that is the site of this residence. It is a sharply sloping land with access problems, oriented northeastward but with m
A criteria governing this project based on elements was to reduce costs and building time. The main volume of the house rises over a half-buried level delimited by retaining walls of in situ concrete. A whole framework of metal pillars and summers be
The 4,000 square meter site of this one-story residence is a sloping land oriented southward, offering splendid views of the Montseny. With its total floor area o f300 square meters, the building poses on the highest of the three terraces forming the
Siuated in the town of Aravaca, northwest of Madrid, this house and studio for a young couple of graphic designers stands on a rectangular lot with a slight westward slope and access through one of its short sides, to the east. Access is through adja
This house for a real estate promoter and his painter wife is a unique project, both because of its location along the border of Doñana Natural Park, in a property of orange and olive trees with no neighbor less than two kilometers away, and because
The main bulk of this dwelling sits on a long and narrow platform situated on the high part of a smoothly sloping terrain, from which one looking northward can contemplate the extraordinary panorama of the valley and mountains beyond. Whereas one end
Situated on a huge property in the very midst of the Ampurdán plain, the building rises on flat ground between a grove and a stream. The dominant views combined with sunning conditions to favor the elaboration of a linear construction, one open to th
Formed by the joining of two lots, the 1,532 square meter site of this residence in the Barcelona locality of L ’Ametlla del Vallés presents two flat levels, with a three-meter height difference between them. The building is basically a parallelepipe
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