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Historical Archive which, thanks to its documental richness, provides a large amount of valuable –and in some cases unpublished– graphic documentation.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.
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.
Located in the Eixample district, the Jeroni Francesc Granell House is a building between partitions that is located on the block of houses bounded by Girona, Mallorca, Bailèn and València Streets. It has a single exterior façade facing Girona Street, from where the main access takes place, and an interior façade facing the courtyard of the block.
With a rectangular plan, the vertical structure of this neighbour's house includes a ground floor with a semi-basement and mezzanine, five floors and a passable roof. The main entrance gives way to a long hall area which gives way to the neighbours’ staircase and the rear courtyard of the building.
The façade structures its openings in four vertical axes of regular rhythm, forming an axial composition around a central body formed by two axes of paired windows and two lateral bodies formed by a line of simple balconies. The ground floor, which also includes a semi-basement and mezzanine, is configured as a Montjuïc stone basement. The main access to the estate is at the southern end of the façade, closed by a solid oak door and a coloured stained glass overdoor. The openings of this plinth have their jambs, sills and lintels surrounded by a sinuous moulding.
From the first floor, the central body of the façade is covered with green and pink sgraffitos, drawing complex and varied plant motifs based on five-pointed leaves. On each of the floors, both the balconies and the paired windows that open onto the street have their stone frames forming sinuous curved decorations moulded on the over-doors. The balconies, which are only located in the two bodies that vertically flank the façade, have rectangular stone slabs with rounded corners and a wrought iron railing. Each of these openings has its original closures, consisting of windows decorated with stained glass and pink porticos. The cornice, consisting of a double moulding of work containing small quadrangular breathers, stands out for its curved shape. All in all, this façade is a compendium of various ornamental solutions typical of modernism inspired by flowers and rockery.
The lobby is the space that gives access to the property and distributes its various horizontal properties. It is accessed through the main door vestibule, an elongated space of rectangular plan with marble floors and gilt marble-clad handrails and green glazed ceramic stems. A sgraffito decoration based on floral borders in the form of interlaced Hispanic irises appears on these wainscots. The lobby ceilings stand out for their decoration in polychrome stucco, based on floral prints and bouquets of Hispanic irises and peacock feathers. The staircase that leads to the mezzanine is at the back of this hall, where the cellar containing the neighbours' staircase and the elevator is located, profusely ornamented with sgraffitos.
This building was designed by Jeroni Francesc Granell i Manresa in 1901 and was completed in 1903. The architect conceived his own house as a multi-family property that allowed him to extract income by applying rental regimes. Apparently, Granell was not only the owner and architect of the building, but also the builder and supplier of the stained-glass windows that decorate the openings, through his company Rigalt i Granell.
Jeroni Ferran Granell i Manresa