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Historical Archive which, thanks to its documental richness, provides a large amount of valuable –and in some cases unpublished– graphic documentation.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.
Built close to the Girasol building in Madrid, this is one of the first works in which Coderch applies the recessed plan typology in the form of a comb, which will be developed in subsequent larger-scale actions in the housing complexes for Urquijo Bank and of the Garages of Sarrià in Barcelona.
The building is developed in three bodies of four heights and two apartments per floor, all of them oriented towards the south and the sea. The location, quite far away from the coastline, and the relative density of the urban area within the area of tourist use where it is located, allow the adoption of criteria similar to those of the blocks in urban planning, both in the building typology and in that of the apartments, with a living-dining room, terrace, three bedrooms, kitchen, bathroom and laundry room, identical to that of the conventional residential unit. The large terraces that cover the entire width of the living areas stand out, as well as the provision of communal outdoor space with gardens and a swimming pool, elements typical of the complex's holiday destination and second home.
The austere treatment of the façades – all of them made of exposed brick with windows of the same size – which incorporate fixed glass in the sill area to increase the light in the bedrooms, accentuates the powerful volumetry of the building and the author's characteristic formal canons.