Fàbrica Casarramona, Barcelona

Author Josep Puig i Cadafalch Situation Av. Frank Ferrer and guard /Mexico, 36-44 Special interest interesting interest Protection of Cultural Property of national interest (BCIN) Exceptional modernist building built between 1909 and 1911 as a blanket and towel factory, owned by the cotton industrialist Casimir Casarramona I Puigcercos, who died in 1913, shortly after the inauguration. It had an ephemeral life because in 1920 it went bankrupt, after the general strike. During the exhibition of 1929 it was used as a warehouse and after the Civil War, and until 1992, it was used as a garage and stables of the national police, although since 1963 it was owned by La Caixa. In 2002 this entity decided to rehabilitate the complex and turn it into the CaixaForum cultural Center. This work by Puig i Cadafalch constitutes the most successful example of modernist industrial architecture in Catalonia. Built mainly of exposed brick, with details of wrought iron, stone and ceramics, its forms evoke a medieval crenellated Castle. Structurally, the roofs are made of barrel vaults with beams supported by riveted steel profiles. The terraces are not flat, but undulating. Externally, two towers stand out that break the feeling of horizontality of the whole, and that served to contain water tanks. Running on electric power, it did not need a chimney. Arata Isozaigii designed the monumental glass and steel structure, in The Shape of a tree, included in the remodeling in 2002...

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