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Historical Archive which, thanks to its documental richness, provides a large amount of valuable –and in some cases unpublished– graphic documentation.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:
2019-2025 Aureli Mora i Omar OrnaqueDocumental Commission:
2019-2025 Ramon Faura Carolina B. Garcia Eduard Callís Francesc Rafat Pau Albert Antoni López Daufí Joan Falgueras Mercè Bosch Jaume Farreny Anton Pàmies Juan Manuel Zaguirre Josep Ferrando Fernando Marzá Moisés Puente Aureli Mora Omar OrnaqueCollaborators:
2019-2025 Lluis Andreu Sergi Ballester Maria Jesús Quintero Lucía M. Villodres Montse ViuExternal Collaborators:
2019-2025 Helena Cepeda Inès MartinelWith the support of:
Generalitat de Catalunya. Departament de CulturaCollaborating Entities:
ArquinFADFundació Mies van der Rohe
Fundación DOCOMOMO Ibérico
Basílica de la Sagrada Família
Museu del Disseny de Barcelona
Fomento
AMB
EINA Centre Universitari de Disseny i Art de Barcelona
IEFC
Fundació Domènench Montaner.
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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
Eduard Maria Balcells i Buigas va néixer a Barcelona l’any 1877 i va morir l’any 1965. Fill d’en Eduard Balcells, un advocat de Tarragona, i de Concepció Buïgas Monravà, germana de l'arquitecte que va construir el monument a Colom. Va ser el quart de nou germans i cosí directe d’en Carles Buïgas. A l'Escola d'Arquitectura de Barcelona va coincidir amb en Pere Domènech Roura, fill d’en Lluís Domènech i Montaner, obtenint el títol d’arquitecte el 1905. Balcells durant molts anys va ser arquitecte municipal a Cerdanyola. Entre els seus projectes destaquen: la casa construïda pel pianista Enrique Calado a Sant Cugat (1905); la casa Tosquella al carrer Ballester al barri de Sant Gervasi de Barcelona (1906); la casa Lluch a Sant Cugat (1906); o la casa Mestres a Cerdanyola (1906). Cal dir que en Eduard Maria Balcells va estar influenciat pels diversos moviments arquitectònics de l’època: modernisme, noucentisme o brutalisme, la qual cosa queda reflectida a les seves construccions.
Source: Arxiu Històric del COAC
Works (17)
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Constellation
Chronology (18)
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Lluch House
Small palace with three floors with a functional overlap characteristic of palaces: semi-buried ground floor taking advantage of the natural unevenness of the hill, floor plan with halls, rooms, small rooms, dining room and library. Second floor where there are the bedrooms and a second floor where there is the attic with access to the roof. The facade is structured from volumes of geometric bodies divided into three distinct parts making a triangular portal with smooth pointed in the central crugia. On the outside there is a combination of white and blue trencadís majolica combined with white plastering, exposed billet and stucco. Decoration of lights and wrought iron grills. -
Can Barnils
Isolated house surrounded by a large garden. It has a rectangular structure, ground floor and main floor. Three bodies have been differentiated on the main façade by means of the central body that protrudes above the façade and by a porch at the entrance door crowned by a balcony with a railing of latticework with a floral theme. There is abundant floral theme decoration on the windows too. A frieze separates the first floor from the crowning of the façade. On one of the lateral sides a lookout tower rises. The façades are plastered with fake stone veneer and the central body is plastered white. On October 10, 1908, Mr. Manuel Mir requested the building permit, according to the project of Eduard M. Balcells. -
Clergy House - Rectory
It is a building intended for parish housing services. It presents some ornamental and constructive elements typical of the last stage of modernism where simple geometric shapes such as pointed arches formed with blown bricks are mixed with other curved geometric elements. A tower-shaped element stands out in one of the corners in one of the vertices in which the entrance door is located, covered by moulded buttresses and a gallery formed by a roof supported by stretchers. The floor plan of the building is rectangular with a hipped roof. -
Mònaco House
Square building with symmetrical axial distribution, according to the entrance axis which is indicated by a canopy balcony. The façades are plastered. The window sills, the cornices, and the roof railings are of traditional moulded mortar and with vegetal patterns. -
Concurs Anual d'Edificis i Establiments Urbans
Award-Winner / Winner. Category: Arquitectura - Millor Establiment ConstruïtParada de Carn nº435-436 d'Antònia GiraltVapor Sampere Factory Building
The project completes a block occupied by the remains of the Vapor Sampere, one of the main examples of early 20th century industrial architecture in Sabadell. The volumetry of the building and the treatment of the façades are determined by the different conditions of the surroundings. The maximum height is at the Tres Creus/Sallarès i Pla corner, and the minimum height is in Carrer Turull. Towards the south side, with the best views of the Vapor, the building opens up with a broken diagonal that transforms the interior space into a semi-public enclosure. The exterior façade combines the layout of the exposed brick, the windows and the skylights of the stairwells to break the monotony. Once the volumetry and skin have been defined, the dwellings have living rooms on the south side, enclosed with wooden projecting blinds that shade the sunlight and allow the use of the outdoor galleries almost all year round.Angela Gual Canudes House
City-garden typology home built on a quadrangular space, surrounded by a brick fence with a combination of grating and chamfering at the corner of the door. The building is a rectangular cube with ground floor, main floor and attic, covered on two sides with an open turret that includes a staircase around which the composition revolves. The entrance angle is occupied by a porch open to the garden. It is white with a combination of stone and ceramics of different colours: mainly green, yellow, red and gold. Great vertical emphasis given by the pinion-shaped gables, windows, tower and tribune in a conical shape and triangular base. The decoration, Mackintosh type, is typical of Balcells' early modernism, which follows the same guidelines as in the Mestres house in Cerdanyola. The interior is divided into two floors: on the ground floor, there is the hall leading to the dining room, where there is a large fireplace, and in the middle, there is the staircase leading to the first floor. On one side we can find the kitchen and the toilet, and on the other a room. On the first floor, there are four bedrooms, one of them with a cabinet and a gallery. In the turret there is a spiral staircase and the materials used are stone and tile cladding. A project was made in 1910 before the existing one. When the tower was built (1912), the project was completely modified. On the other hand, Gual Tower is part of the most constructive period in the town, years 1910-1920, when Cardedeu was definitively transformed into a summer resort, one of the most important in the eastern Vallès along with La Garriga.Genís i Pont Office
Office located in a corner between two streets, composed of ground floor and a main floor. The building underwent renovations and has a very simple and almost free floor plan. The façades follow a modernist style, presenting a great wealth of ornamentation, with a great variety of motifs and materials (stone, stucco, ceramics, wrought iron, etc.). The office forms a functional unit with the adjacent building. The first floor has a balcony with a couple of windows on each side.Joan Carol Prat Mausoleum
Mausoleum of Joan Carol Prat, built in 1918 by the architect Eduard M. Balcells Buïgas and the sculptor Metzner. Four columns with a rectangular base on each side that support a stepped structure with the tomb stand on a stone plinth. A large cross and a figure in front of it stands at the back. Three of the columns are flanked by a figure holding a small column with both hands. The entire tomb is made of stone with the surname Carol engraved on the front.Generalife House
Large house following the Arabic decoration and construction. It consists of two floors and maintains a rectangular structure. The walls are plastered in white and the windows are horseshoe arches with neo-Arabic ornamental details - arcades and sgraffitos similar to those of the Alhambra. At the back of the house, a tower that is crowned by a dome rises, with ceramic decoration in white and blue stripes. In the same area, there is another construction for the country house that maintains a similar but not as elaborate structure.Masia Rocabruna
The house is located about 12 metres away from the old Rocabruna country house, to which it is connected by a stone corridor. The house, which is more or less square in plan, is built of stone, combining greyish limestone with reddish sandstone. The building, which simulates a castle, has three storeys and a four-sided roof with a central dome. The main façade is enclosed by two towers – the eastern one slightly higher than the western one (which imitates the Romanesque style). The centre of the façade has two large balconies suspended by ornate columns with capitals featuring sculpted animals of prey and floral decorations. Neo-Romanesque, neo-Gothic, Art Nouveau and other elements characteristic of eclectic architecture can be seen on all sides of the building. The interior, now empty, is centred by a grand staircase of cut stone, which ends up imitating a cloister. The light is provided by a dome decorated with stained glass windows. A wool manufacturer from Sabadell, Joan Gorina, bought the goods from a German ship, held up in the port of Barcelona, at a very good price. He resold the goods in France and Italy, making a fortune. Gorina had the whim to build himself a castle, and with the money obtained he bought the Rocabruna country house and those of Güell, La vila and L'alou, commissioning an architect to build a castle next to the old Rocabruna house. Construction was completed in three years (1918-1920). The old house was used for the butler and servants, and in the new construction the necessary rooms for the residence were prepared, as well as a museum, weapons room, chapel, music room, billiard room... among others. Years later, the Gorina family bought the Rocafort house and other nearby country houses. Since 1980, it has been owned by Saad Bin Abdul Al Saul, Prince of Arabia, and since then it has been practically impossible to access the property.
