About
In this first stage, the catalogue focuses on the modern and contemporary architecture designed and built between 1832 –year of construction of the first industrial chimney in Barcelona that we establish as the beginning of modernity– until today.
The project is born to make the architecture more accessible both to professionals and to the citizens through a website that is going to be updated and extended. Contemporary works of greater general interest will be incorporated, always with a necessary historical perspective, while gradually adding works from our past, with the ambitious objective of understanding a greater documented period.
The collection feeds from multiple sources, mainly from the generosity of architectural and photographic studios, as well as the large amount of excellent historical and reference editorial projects, such as architectural guides, magazines, monographs and other publications. It also takes into consideration all the reference sources from the various branches and associated entities with the COAC and other collaborating entities related to the architectural and design fields, in its maximum spectrum.
Special mention should be made of the incorporation of vast documentation from the COAC Historical Archive which, thanks to its documental richness, provides a large amount of valuable –and in some cases unpublished– graphic documentation.
The rigour and criteria for selection of the works has been stablished by a Documental Commission, formed by the COAC’s Culture Spokesperson, the director of the COAC Historical Archive, the directors of the COAC Digital Archive, and professionals and other external experts from all the territorial sections that look after to offer a transversal view of the current and past architectural landscape around the territory.
The determination of this project is to become the largest digital collection about Catalan architecture; a key tool of exemplar information and documentation about architecture, which turns into a local and international referent, for the way to explain and show the architectural heritage of a territory.
About us
Project by: 
Created by: 
Directors:
2019-2024 Aureli Mora i Omar OrnaqueDocumental Commission:
2019-2024 Ramon Faura Carolina B. Garcia Francesc Rafat Antoni López Daufí Joan Falgueras Anton Pàmies Mercè Bosch Josep Ferrando Fernando Marzá Aureli Mora Omar OrnaqueExternal Collaborators:
2019-2024 Lluis Andreu Sergi Ballester Helena Cepeda Inès Martinel Maria Jesús QuinteroWith the support of:
Generalitat de Catalunya. Departament de CulturaCollaborating Entities:
ArquinFADFundació Mies van der Rohe
Fundación DOCOMOMO Ibérico
Arxiu Mas
Basílica de la Sagrada Família
Museu del Disseny de Barcelona
EINA Centre Universitari de Disseny i Art de Barcelona
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We kindly invite you to help us improve the dissemination of Catalan architecture through this space. Here you can propose works and provide or amend information on authors, photographers and their work, along with adding comments. The Documentary Commission will analyze all data. Please do only fill in the fields you deem necessary to add or amend the information.
The Arxiu Històric del Col·legi d'Arquitectes de Catalunya is one of the most important documentation centers in Europe, which houses the professional collections of more than 180 architects whose work is fundamental to understanding the history of Catalan architecture. By filling this form, you can request digital copies of the documents for which the Arxiu Històric del Col·legi d'Arquitectes de Catalunya manages the exploitation of the author's rights, as well as those in the public domain. Once the application has been made, the Arxiu Històric del Col·legi d'Arquitectes de Catalunya will send you an approximate budget, which varies in terms of each use and purpose.
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Memory
Arquitecte urbanista. Titulat el 1935. Treballà per a la Diputació Provincial de Barcelona (1944) i va ser director de l’ Oficina d’Urbanisme Provincial (1948). És autor de diversos plans Generals, especialment del PGO de Barcelona (1959). Entre les seves obres trobem les Llars Mundet (1957) a Horta, la piscina Sant Jordi de Barcelona (1966) o la Residència Col·legi Bell-lloc (1968), a la Roca del Vallès
Source: Arxiu Històric del COAC
Works (10)
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Chronology (10)
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Montbau Estate: Second Unit
Manuel Baldrich Tibau, Antoni Bonet Castellana, Pedro López Iñigo, Josep Maria Soteras i Mauri
When the decision to build the second sector was made in 1961, the Board of Trustees commissioned the architects Manuel Baldrich, Antoni Bonet, Pedro López Iñigo and Josep Soteras to drat the corresponding architectural project. What were the reasons for choosing this heterogeneous team, made up of two municipal architects, a provincial architect and an independent architect, who had just arrived from Argentina with an obvious professional prestige? This team, despite the presence of municipal architects, one of them co-author of the first Plan, decided that it could not be limited to design the buildings, but it was also necessary to completely redo the urban structure of that sector. A new Plan was therefore drawn up, which was approved on July 2, 1962. With this new Plan it seems that exactly the double number of dwellings that had been initially planned in that sector were built. -
Apartaments Vilafortuny
Los apartamentos se ubican en una parcela situada a escasos 50 metros de la playa de Vilafortuny. El conjunto se articula en forma de ‘L’, con los núcleos de comunicación, escaleras y corredores abiertos encarados al viento y a la orientación más desfavorable –norte–. Los apartamentos se ordenan según una sucesión de piezas repetidas que cuentan con la protección solar de los balcones y ventilación cruzada. El programa es muy sencillo, compuesto por cocina abierta al estar-comedor, un dormitorio y un baño. El conjunto consta de 38 apartamentos agrupados en dos lotes de planta baja y una planta piso. Uno de ellos, está formado por 22 unidades dispuestas en batería mientras que el otro consta de 16 unidades dispuestas en diagonal. Baldrich propone un ritmo visual derivado del desplazamiento de la unidad elemental para procurar vistas al mar, sin comprometer la privacidad entre las celdas. Baldrich fue director de la Oficina de urbanismo provincial de Barcelona –1948– y autor de diversos planes generales, entre los que cabe destacar el Plan General de Ordenación de la provincia de Barcelona –1959–. En la obra de Baldrich se manifiesta la influencia europea de las teorías urbanas de ciudad funcional. La abstracción de las fachadas y la composición volumétrica de los edificios lo vinculan al lenguaje depurado y preciso del neoplasticismo. Baldrich oculta el aspecto doméstico de las viviendas y muestra elementos de la modernidad: nuevos materiales, industrialización, seriación, tecnología. -
Block Q of Montbau Estate
Manuel Baldrich Tibau, Antoni Bonet Castellana, Pedro López Iñigo, Josep Maria Soteras i Mauri
356.The design of the Q block, together with the P and R, made it possible to double the density of the building in the second stage of Montbau’s construction, separated from the first by the Torrent Central (Pomaret). Organisationally, it is similar to the L’s short arm of block P, with a square plant and 17 m laterally. In the same way, the staircase is in the middle and gives access to 4 houses per landing. But having 14 floors in height instead of just 4, requires the installation of elevators. Two of them are placed per block, serving the even and odd plants respectively. The other differentiating factor is the 45º turn with respect to the arrangement of the other buildings, in order to achieve a good orientation and to avoid the frontality between the towers, optimising the views and the sunlight that all the houses receive. It is the only building for which the ground was leveled, so that all 4 façades are of the same height. The structure of this building is mixed with concrete and masonry. At the time, there was still a tendency to build taller buildings with the load-bearing wall system. In this case, the reinforced concrete is introduced into the exterior walls and the brick is retained for the interior structure. -
Block P of Montbau Estate
Manuel Baldrich Tibau, Antoni Bonet Castellana, Pedro López Iñigo, Josep Maria Soteras i Mauri
In the second stage of planning the Montbau housing estate, there is an increase in building density. It will be the way some buildings are grouped together and the increase in height of others that will make it possible to achieve this. The resulting public space has a more domestic scale, generating small squares around the building. The P block is one of the types developed for this purpose. A succession of L-shaped blocks, staggered, generates a unique framework, around which 3 separate groups are projected, formed by 3 towers each and which close the whole. The homes on the long side of the L have a ventilated and illuminated staircase on the facade and access from the street to the second-floor level, which requires a different typology to the first floor. Here the houses have only one façade, facing the square. On the second, third and fourth floors there are two homes per landing, with a front and rear façade. On the short side of the L, the staircase is in the middle of the floor and gives access to four apartments per landing. In the block, all parts, except for the toilets, are exterior. And both in the rooms and in the main bedrooms, there is a setback in the façade plan that gives an outdoor space, some terraces, in front of them and generates a very characteristic compositional element that is different from the rest of the façades that do not face the square. The constructive system of load-bearing brick walls allows these large openings, given that they are perpendicular to the south and north façades. The façades combine the work seen with glazed ceramic pieces from La Bisbal in blueish and greenish colours. -
Sant Jordi Swimming Pool
Originally, the Industrial School had been the Batlló Factory. It was closed in 1889 due to social problems and was sold in 1906. It immediately became the Industrial School, which began operating in 1910. Between 1927 and 1934, a series of reforms were introduced, especially in the central access section. The extensions of the 1960s are the work of Baldrich, who without giving up the rationalist style or the new materials, knew how to perfectly combine the new buildings with the existing complex. The extensions consist of adding new bodies, increasing the number of floors and making connections. The Sant Jordi swimming pool is part of the Baldrich reform and expansion project, it is located inside the enclosure and has a double access, from the street and from the campus. It is the only piece that clearly differs from the rest, partly due to its dimensions and functional characteristics. It was built on the same grounds as the Industrial School, where an old 50-metre open-air pool already existed and it became the first 50-metre covered pool in Catalonia. Internally, the project is organised around a central corridor that separates the pool from the sports court and allows access to the stands of both spaces.
Archive
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Drawing
Perspectiva de l'exterior del Polígon Montbau: Unitat Nord-Est.
Arxiu Històric del COAC