Tile Vaults in Contemporary Argentina

Abstract

Around the architect Eduardo Sacriste (1905-1999), professor at the Instituto de Arquitectura y Urbanism de Tucuman and a noted scholar of vaulted architecture and construction, a prolific generation of architects and builders emerged in Argentina in the middle decades of the twentieth century. Many designed buildings covered with tile vaults or, in some cases, with different variations on this system. Among them were professionals like Eduardo Larran, who is still using these vaults in his current buildings. Most of these buildings were quite simple: thick brick walls supporting a series of lowered barrel vaults. Aesthetical inspiration came from the few examples where modem architecture used tiled vaults (Garraf houses, J.L. Sert, or houses Jaoul and Sarabhai, Le Corbusier) while technical support came not only from Sacriste's international research on vernacular vaulting, but also from some northern Argentine traditions those of the province of Cordoba and, more specifically, the ones in Mar Chiquita. Most of the experiences they carried out are collected in Viviendas con bovedas, a detailed study of tile vault construction written by architects Sacriste, Kechichian, and Mackintosh in the late 70s. The interest of these buildings lies both in the use of classic tile vaulting and the evolution of this system (caused by shortages of materials and absence of manual skilled labour) to new variants, some of great interest. Most of these variants, which were designed at the time for a particular area, have transcended its local condition: the legacy of Sacriste's generation is clear, at present, not only in some recent attempts to recuperate tile construction, but in numerous international projects of lightweight vault construction.