DETAILING IN THE ARCHITECTURE OF J.A.CODERCH
ABSTRACT
The thesis dissertation deals with the work of J.A.Coderch from the construction detailing. Coderch made a special emphasis in its definition, and even though he never abandoned the traditional roots in which he based his architecture, he transformed the way of detailing, in a way that had a strong impact in the image of his buildings. In this work it is taken for granted that the construction detailing is part of the design project, with which shares objectives and goals, and therefore the material solutions end to be the expression of a particular search in architecture that takes place in the design process.
There has been two parallel lines of leading the study: one facing the architectural context that Coderch lived in his beginnings, in order to find the references influenced him the most, and the other analyzing a number of buildings, from the beginning of their placement on the site to their construction finishing and detailing.
In the years that Coderch was at the School of architecture in Barcelona, the GATEPAC leaded the expansion of modern architecture in Spain, and highlighted the presence of modern values in the traditional Mediterranean architecture. Early in his professional career, Coderch shared this concern on approaching tradition to modern architecture, and get actively involved in national and international movements.
Coderch – once the orthodoxy of modern architecture was overcame – get closer to F.Ll.Wright premises of organic architecture, where traditional and advanced means where living together. The plasticity was claimed by Wright as continuity, and lead him to a change in the perception of space and its construction detailing. In Coderch architecture, the construction elements disappear within a continuous solution, from which they are very difficult to understand isolated from the whole. They all are undertaking a role in the definition of a sense of space, that is the important reason to which techniques work together, overcoming the individual role of a wall, a roof, a door or a window.
Through the analysis of the design process of his buildings, it has been observed that Coderch starts a project from the placement on the site, develops his proposal moulding the interior space, and finishes it with the detailing, in which he relies very much for the overall unity of the final result. He emphasizes a special detail of the facade, by repeating it trough the whole, as a solution to avoid any exception that may flourish from a design that, while is conducted from the interior space, keeps the outside appearance flexible trough the process.
Given that architecture pursuits the goal of constructing a place, the way of perceiving that specific place through the enclosure and its limits is where the architect shows a specific way of making architecture, and where the detailing plays a essential role. Coderch focuses on the interior-exterior relationship, and therefore is mainly through the window where one may see the specific search of a place. The way he opens a window on the wall, and establishes the limits between the interior and the space, is linked to the Mediterranean tradition, (very much related to references from his years of student), and it is searched through all his projects.