Foster+Partners’ first commission in Chile involves regenerating an existing mid-20th-century textile factory in the heart of Santiago. It will be part of a new mixed-use urban quarter. The masterplan extends onto an adjacent site, towards the plant’
With a built-up area of 5,500 square meters, the Matta Sur complex comprises two volumes. First is the former Metropolitan Lyceum of Santiago – built in 1891 and structurally gravely damaged by the 2010 earthquake – has been consolidated and renovate
Located in the Montenegro neighborhood of the Chilean capital, this single-household dwelling is crowned with a thin volume which, clad in stainless steel panels and featuring a skylight, is the only part of the building that can be seen from the sur
The reuse of old abandoned structures, equipped with new programs, allows giving these buildings a renewed vitality. This recycling exercise entails a commitment with urban sustainability, maintaining the dynamism of built-up urban fabrics. On the ed
The project is inserted in the very center of the grid that brought the city of Santiago into being in 1541, a matrix that became the urban paradigm of the Laws of the Indies in America. A good portion of this grid still organizes the continuous and
This museum was built as a tribute to Violeta Parra (1917-1967), one of the most complete and prominent figures of Chilean art. Her multiple facets (musician, poet, visual artist, ceramist, researcher, staunch defender of the people, uncompromising c
Canonized in 2005, the Chilean Jesuit Alberto Hurtado (1901-1952) devoted his life to providing assistance and comfort to children and young people in need, a mission for which he became a prominent figure in the first half of the 20th century. In 19
The nueva Costanera neighborhood, east of Santiago, has in the past years gone from being a garden-city residential structure to a more urban one. The old residences have opened their parks to public space, extending the pedestrian areas and includin
Built in the last decade of the 18th century and designed by the Italian Joaquín Toesca y Ricci (disciple of Francisco Sabatini), the Palacio de La Moneda is one of the most beautiful neoclassical buildings in South America, and is the seat of Chile’
The construction of the city is a permanent and by definition unfinished process, and always a reflection of the society that builds it. As a collective creation, the city is the depositary of multiple grids and flows that sum complex and sometimes c
Agriculture shaped the ethos of the Chilean people in the 18th and 19th centuries. This ethos found its urban correlate in the garden-city that served as expansion model for the city of Santiago during the second half of the 20th century. The extensi
The seismic nature of Chilean territory marks the country’s architecture, as this tower shows. The commission brought the opportunity to address this universal type from a local perspective, making the tactile prevail over the aluminum or glass walls
Contributing to the renewal of the historic city appears to be the most sustainable strategy to preserve the vitality of the urban fabric, resisting in this way the erosion that the unbridled growth of the peripheries has caused in the city. The muse
The project for the new embassy of Brazil in Santiago, Chile restores a 19th-century palace, adds buildings to the complex, and unifies them by means of a permeable skin of pinewood.
Out of all the possible landscapes, the one we see daily is the one that disappears the most. Not so long ago, we traced the silhouette of a cloud on a window. The glass extended its functions with this drawing: besides unsuccessfully trying to be in
This is a compact piece with three stacked floors. Its internal logic has two basic dimensions: a regular horizontal one and an irregular vertical one. Each floor plan is an unspecific grid of walls and openings that configure cubic rooms. The horizo
Measuring 30 meters high and 30 in diameter, the temple forms a flower of nine petals made up of cast glass pieces on the outside and translucent marble on the inside; the pieces are framed with aluminum and installed with a crane on a steel superstr
The lack of quality urban spaces is one the greatest shortages of Santiago de Chile. With a population of over six million, and despite the sustained economic growth over the last decades, the urban space has not been adequately planned to provide gr
Descollando del perfil bajo de su entorno, el escultórico volumen de hormigón armado tan sólo se matiza mediante huecos de escala aparentemente ciclópea y profundos para protegerse de la radiación solar.
The Siamese Towers are the result of a project commissioned by the Catholic University of Chile to house all its computer systems and related spaces in a glass tower with a very technological appearance. The project ponders on the integration of the
The Medical School of the Catholic University of Chile is north of the urban center of Santiago. In such a central location the context is denser than usual for this type of academic facility, so the project is designed in height, with three floors b
The commune of Lo Barnechea, northeast of Santiago, is one of the most expensive areas in the city. However, its urban tissue is filled with contrasts, because there are areas with luxury homes and also dense zones of social housing, as well as self-
The housing project in Renca, a community northwest of Santiago, took shape when a group of families living in informal settlements of the area got together to ask for decent housing without having to be pushed to the outskirts. They were offered a n
El equipo de arquitectos afincado en São Paulo, Estudio América, ha finalizado la construcción del Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos en Santiago de Chile. El proyecto, que se inscribe dentro de los actos conmemorativos del bicentenario de la
Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, Santiago (Chile) The IV Latin American Biennial of Architecture and Civil Engineering, organized by an assorted group of univeristies, professional associations and government institutions from Spain and Peru, and with hou
