The plans of the project are signed by Antoni Maria Gallissà because in 1896 Puig i Cadafalch was no longer the municipal architect because of his bad relationship with the Mataró City Council. The house skillfully combines a wide range of ornamental languages, such as sculpture, glass, sgraffitos and ceramics. The stone is not only used to frame the openings, but serves to incorporate the carvings of the sculptor Arnau, who sculpted two relevant figures: the first one is on the tympanum of the door and represents a girl wearing a spindle, a textile emblem that alludes to the owner's industry, while the second figure is at the foot of one of the arches and is the usual Saint George. The rest of the façade is covered with graffiti, and the tribune stands outs, with Nordic reminiscences. The staggered crowning announces the profile of Barcelona’s Amatller House.

This work was a refurbishment of the façade, since the building had to be simple like the ones that surrounded it in Carrer d'Argentona. It was therefore given a sloping roof, a tribune, windows and a stone portal with ornamental details worked with Gothic reminiscences and elements sculpted by Eusebi Arnau.

As for the interior, we must mention the luxurious visiting room where the coffered ceiling and stained-glass windows stand out, as well as the office of Joaquim Coll i Regàs with a fireplace where his initials are scribbled.

On the inner side of the building there was the garden where other rooms of the house looked like the kitchen and the dining room, where we should also mention the decoration of the coffered ceilings.

The upper floor is arranged symmetrically to the first floor around the courtyard of light, but the treatment of the decoration of this part of the house is, in general, much poorer.

At the top we find a huge attic, from which you can access the tower by stairs, although it seems that originally you could go up to the narrow lookout without having to go through the attic.

Since the house is raised a metre above street level, the basement is at the same height as the garden, but you can also access it through some stairs that are below the ones that go up to the house.

DESCRIPTION

The Coll i Regàs house is located on a plot of land in the western extension of the city of Mataró, configured from the walled enclosure of the 16th century, finally defined and organised according to the plan of the engineer Melcior de Palau and the architect Emili Cabanyes during the last quarter of the 19th century.

It presents, from its origin, a desire for singularity not followed by any other contemporary or later intervention.

It is a modernist building built in 1897. It occupies a double-sided plot between partitions. Its façade measures 11 m and its strict depth is 25 m, to which a rear gallery and the roof over the basement with the side body of the kitchen at a complementary depth of 7.50 m must be added.

It consists of a basement floor, a ground floor slightly raised with respect to the street level in order to ventilate the basement, a floor plan and an attic floor under the roof overhangs. There is also a turret.

Fortunately, the Coll i Regàs house has survived to this day with most of the decoration. One can appreciate the original spatial sense of its architecture that does not depend only on the volumes and composition but also on the materials, polychromies and textures of the facings. At the Coll i Regàs house, a wide variety of trades take place: stone sculpture, wrought iron, stuccos and sgraffitos, mosaics, ceramics, carpentry, glasswork, metalwork, furniture, combining products industrial ones on the market with others of their own design that personalise the façades, interior facings and the space.

On the main façade you can observe the sculptural work carried out by Eusebi Arnau, while it is also present in some interior elements. The tribune, in the Gothic tradition with helical columns, the profusely framed windows and the stepped finish of the ceramic in vivid tones, marks a distinction on the outside that does not detract from the interior.

Despite being one of the first works of Josep Puig i Cadafalch, it already incorporates the whole range of architectural and artistic constants that this architect later used in his remarkable career.

In 1897, work began on the house of Joaquim Coll i Regàs, who had inherited a knitwear factory from his uncle, a family business. Just five years before the work was undertaken, the factory had experienced a considerable boost thanks to exports to Cuba and Puerto Rico favoured by the protectionist laws.

The project was signed by Antoni Maria Gallissà, even though at that time Puig i Cadafalch, the true author, was no longer the municipal architect of Mataró and, therefore, there was no incompatibility.

HISTORICAL REPORT

No one doubts that it is a building designed and directed by the architect Josep Puig i Cadafalch on behalf of the industrialist Joaquim Coll i Regàs, despite the fact that in the original project, presented to the town hall in 1897, there is his signature, but also that of the architect Antoni Maria Gallissà. The building, on the other hand, is also known as Casa Fontdevila, the later owner, due to the premature death of Joaquim Coll. Designed and built as a single-family home, it is currently owned by the Caixa Laietana foundation, which maintains it for welfare (basement), representative and cultural uses. The 1987 restoration, facilitated by Caixa Laietana, has been very faithful and respectful of the original. Finally, it is necessary to highlight the great similarities between this building and the Ametller house - Passeig de Gràcia, Barcelona - built two years later, in 1900.