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Historical Archive which, thanks to its documental richness, provides a large amount of valuable –and in some cases unpublished– graphic documentation.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.
It consists of a very long façade (250ml) in a compromised situation: the gateway to the Vila Olímpica from the city, framing the two iconic towers of the Port Olímpic together with the curved façade of MBM.
There are 3 singularities in the development of the façade, all of them in the northern end:
1. It is the tallest building at its end.
2. It is a bridge building over Doctor Trueta Street.
3. There was an "absorption" by part of the existing office building which forced an effort of containment and compositional rigors able to absorb all the "accidents" in a unitary and orderly concept of the façade conceived as a limit and presentation of the neighbourhood.
The celebration of the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona meant a major urban transformation of the city.
As a result of this and in the urban planning framework of the location of the areas intended for the different events, it was necessary to review the new Urban Planning of the Façade to the Sea of Barcelona, the Vila Olímpica and the recovery of the coast. The urban transformation of a part of the city had to work with a degraded urban structure, oppressed by the railway tracks, turning its back on the sea and with the establishment of old industries, many obsolete or in the process of being dismantled, representative of the initial stages of the industrialisation of the city and the country and with disaggregated groups of houses and warehouses.
The objectives were clear: the city and the citizen. Opening Barcelona to the sea, starting the process of regeneration of the urban fabric, giving continuity to the urban fabric of the immediate environment, new housing groups, equipment and services, public spaces, gardens and parks, all for a better neighbourhood. The result is the consolidation of the new Icària, born suddenly, which has no limits and shares the life and traditions of a neighbourhood with its own history.
The new urban structure was formalised in three major actions:
The beaches, the Passeig Marítim, the Port Olímpic and the facilities that surround it.
The Ronda Litoral and the parks that accompany it and unite the fabric of the Eixample with the sea.
The Residential area, starting from Icària Avenue, which connects La Ciutadella Park with Bogatell Avenue, Ronda Litoral and Marina Street, the backbone of the new neighbourhood, next to Poblenou and which connects the Sagrada Família with the Port Olímpic.
The Residential area, with around 2,000 homes, was designed with the following criteria:
Continuity of the Eixample road network.
Buildings in façade alignment on the main streets.
Priority use of ceramic material on façades.
Creation of landscaped and equipped private spaces for the enjoyment of the residents of each block, as opposed to the large public open spaces of the general planning.
The formal structure of the buildings in Vila Olímpica proposes new types of housing, shallow, guaranteeing cross ventilation and sunlight, consistent with a prioritisation of public space that ensures a diversity of activities. During the Olympic Games, it provided accommodation to the Olympic Family.
With these criteria, the two large buildings that formalise the curved facade of Moscou street – following the trace of the railway underground, without losing their horizontal composition – achieve a unitary reading of the complex, although they correspond to projects by different authors on both sides of Marina Street.
The building of 165 HOUSES in the upper part of Marina Street is part of a project unit, with the OFFICE building and the PRIMARY CARE CENTRE, contributing to qualify the interior space of the block that they delimit. Moscou Street façade incorporates part of the office building in its composition. One of the characteristics of this complex is that the building, acting as a bridge, is crossed by Doctor Trueta Street.
The homes, mostly with three and four rooms and an area between 100/120 m2, had to make the residential program during the Olympic Games compatible with the subsequent housing program for the new neighbourhood.
They have shallow recesses that facilitate ventilation and cross views between the exterior space, streets and parks and the gardened interior of the block. The built height corresponds to the ground floor, mostly with housing and six floors, except for the part closest to the intersection of Doctor Trueta and Joan Miró Streets, which has a ground floor and nine floors.
MBM Arquitectes, Oriol Bohigas i Guardiola, David Mackay, Josep Maria Martorell i Codina, Albert Puigdomènech i Alonso
Maria Pilar de la Villa Ugas, Sergi Godia i Fran, Josep Urgell i Beltrán
MBM Arquitectes, Oriol Bohigas i Guardiola, David Mackay, Josep Maria Martorell i Codina, Albert Puigdomènech i Alonso
Set Pla d'Ordenació de la Vila Olímpica i del Port Olímpic de Barcelona