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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Historical Archive which, thanks to its documental richness, provides a large amount of valuable –and in some cases unpublished– graphic documentation.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.
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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
The program of a greyhound racing track results in a peculiar building with its own easements. Bonet conceives a long construction in the shape of an orange section with a unitary roof. The standard support element consists of a single steel pillar placed in the centre, which supports a flying beam on both sides. The imbalance created is offset by the weight of the umbrella that filters the light from the south, and straps tied to the pillars that counteract its weight. The roof, which is fragile and unstable, is made up of struts that support prefabricated plates, and is permanently fixed by a strap at each end. Below this large, curved plan is the platform that accommodates the movement of spectators, as well as access to the bookmakers and the stands. Beneath the platform there are kennels and service outbuildings.
The Meridiana Dog Track is a paradigmatic example of a building built for a specific function: serving the racetrack of a dog track. Therefore, the building is inseparable from the empty space it serves and cannot be understood without it.
It is lined with Riera d’Horta Street, where the rear façade is. It is accessed at one end. The main façade is not designed to be seen, but to look through.
The public parts of the building are elevated to a whole level and leave the ground floor as a service space, with outbuildings for dog care.
The main space is located on the first floor and is open to the slopes because the stands are arranged from this level down. A huge brise-soleil followed by a steel structure controls the lighting in the room.
The most remarkable feature of the building is its structural boldness: the whole structure, made entirely of steel, works to the limit. There are the least possible steel sections, and the overhangs are almost impossible. The stands are held by the top, without any other support, completely hung on the ground floor.
The roof is a unique, parabolic shell, very light, with regulated geometry (curved shapes made exclusively with straight profiles) that relate it to modernist experiences and, at the same time, allows it to be covered with a minimum of material.
The interior finishes are very austere, almost poor. The structure, the protagonist, is visible everywhere.
The building lost its use as a dog track. The track is now a public park, urbanised so that its geometry can be recognised. It is currently waiting to be rehabilitated as a public facility.
This new feature, which demonstrates the flexibility of the building, also allows you to go through it and admire its entire geometry in an unusual way. This values even more the work of the architects, who seem to have thought of each space as if it could be visited like this from the beginning: there is not a single point from which the building loses strength.
Visiting it allows you to enjoy one of the most unique structures in the city.
This enclosure occupies a whole rectangular block of 10,000 square meters located on the area next to the Congrés neighbourhood of Barcelona, a new neighbourhood planned for the Eucharistic Congress of 1952. The greyhound track is made up of a building for bets, which is located on the longest side of the block, and a racetrack. The building consists of two floors; the ground floor has been designed as an extension of the land and the upper floor as an object completely separated from the ground that serves as a viewpoint.
The steel structure provides a much slimmer and lighter image of the complex than if it were made of concrete. The building has a lenticular floor plan and is very transparent, which makes the precinct resemble the image of airplane wings and a very dynamic appearance. The roof of the ground floor is equipped with steps in the centre and lateral terraces with good visibility, while the slab of the roof supports a hanging structure with solar protection slats, as a brise soleil. The roof is supported by braces that tie the girders to the lower slab and prevent swaying. The brise soleil acts as a counterweight.
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Meridiana Greyhound Stadium
Antoni Bonet Castellana, Josep Puig i Torné
The program of a greyhound racing track results in a peculiar building with its own easements. Bonet conceives a long construction in the shape of an orange section with a unitary roof. The standard support element consists of a single steel pillar placed in the centre, which supports a flying beam on both sides. The imbalance created is offset by the weight of the umbrella that filters the light from the south, and straps tied to the pillars that counteract its weight. The roof, which is fragile and unstable, is made up of struts that support prefabricated plates, and is permanently fixed by a strap at each end. Below this large, curved plan is the platform that accommodates the movement of spectators, as well as access to the bookmakers and the stands. Beneath the platform there are kennels and service outbuildings. -
FAD Award
Award-Winner / Winner. Category: ArchitectureMeridiana Greyhound Stadium
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