The Mar del Plata style (Spanish : Estilo Mar del Plata, chalet Mar del Plata or chalet marplatense [1] ) is a vernacular architectural style very popular during the decades between 1935 and 1950 mainly in the Argentine resort city of Mar del Plata, but extended to nearby coastal towns like Miramar and Necochea. [2]
The style is also often associated in Argentina with the californiano ("Californian"), another vernacular type of house close connected with the American Mission Revival style. [3] Mar del Plata style's features, however, are more related to the older Mar del Plata's picturesque architecture, an eclectic style already popular among the upper-class people who used to spend summertime in this resort city between 1885 and 1945, [4] and to the American Craftsman style. [5] The precursor of the style was the Italian-born architectural engineer Alula Baldassarini, who popularized the use of stone on the frontispieces in 1925. [5] Some of these early examples were labeled chalet inglés ("English chalet"), a type of bungalow or cottage which flourished between 1925 and 1935. [6] Baldassarini also developed a cladding technique known as bastón roto ("'broken stick"), which consisted in rectangular stone bricks irregularly arranged on vertical and horizontal joints. [7]
At the beginning of the 20th century, the upward social mobility was quite more dynamic in Mar del Plata than in Buenos Aires itself, paving the road for a strong middle class, based on tourist services, the building industry and a prosperous commerce. [8] It was during this time that a new urban profile was born in the city, not by a process in which guidelines were designed by technocrats, but by a "democratic" one. [9] By the decade of 1940, the construction sector was regarded as the main industry of Mar del Plata. [10] This is the environment in which the Mar del Plata style emerged. [9]
The chalet marplatense became the materialization of the middle-class ideals, and it is at crossroads between the upper-class summer picturesque residences and the domestic scale, regarding both its social and architectural syncretism. [9] The houses also developed among the immigrants a sense of belonging to their new country. [11]
The rise of the style broke the hegemony of Buenos Aires within Argentina's architectural scene. [12]
The chalets were at first the production of builders with a great experience in the building of eclectic style mansions for summer, but without the skills of a real technician. [13] Nonetheless, the first generation of architects and architectural engineers from Mar del Plata, led by young professionals like Auro Tiribelli, Alberto Córsico Piccolini, José V. Coll, Gabriel Barroso or Raúl Camusso played a key role in the consolidation of the style during the late 1930s an early 1940s. [14] [15] Some sources think of architect Tiribelli as the creator of this type of house. [12] [16]
The chalet marplatense is the translation of the main characteristics of the eclecticism to the domestic space: quartzite stoned facades, monk and nun roof tiles or French tiles, gabled roofs, dormers, blind dormers, attached garage usually with a gable or a dormer on top, chimneys, blind chimneys, ornamental timber frames or log structures, wooden lintels, flowerbeds, front gardens, decorative door ironworks, decorative mission style lanterns and grilles, prominent eaves and stone-cladded porches, commonly vault-shaped or portico style. [17]
The orthoquartzite is also known in Argentina as Piedra Mar del Plata (Mar del Plata stone), [18] both because its use on the houses of this style and the abundance of sandstone quarries southwest of the city. [19] The orthoquartzite has been proposed for nomination to the Global Heritage Stone Resource. [18]
There is the possibility of a subcategorization depending on the main style upon which the chalet is based. In fact, Alberto Córsico Piccolini used to characterize some of his works as normando simplificado ("simplified Norman") when the basic design of the houses displays some features of the Norman architecture at domestic scale. [20]
The style raised some criticism, mostly because the overlapping of rooms and spaces on a reduced area. [21] This characteristic, however, adds contextual value to the townscape where the chalets are homogeneously grouped, usually semi-detached. [22]
Architect and researcher Javier Sáez describes this type of house as one of "domestic ostentation" of the "home of your dreams". He goes even further by coining the phrase "domestic obscenity". [23] [24] Saéz also notices, rather than a syncretism, a conflict between the bourgeoisie pretense of the facades and the obvious taylorization of the floor plans. [25]
The neighbourhoods of La Perla, Stella Maris, Playa Grande, Punta Mogotes and Alfar have today the main concentrations of Mar del Plata style houses. [26] These seaside areas attracted many middle-class tourists, particularly La Perla, thus the chalet played the dual role of home in winter and house for rent in the summer season. [27] A survey conducted in the earlier 2020s listed more than 1300 picturesque houses only at Stella Maris and La Perla, more than 700 of them Mar del Plata style strictly speaking. [28] The oldest residences built in Sierra de los Padres, a hilly area 12 miles west of the city, are also Mar del Plata style chalets. [29] Mass tourism since the 1950s, however, put at risk the survival of the traditional picturesque architecture in Mar del Plata, including the chalet marplatense, in favour of condominiums. [30] [31]
There is a municipal agency which provides tax benefits for the owners to secure the maintenance or restoration of the houses and a handbook with preservation guidelines, created by architect Lorena Marina Sánchez. [26]
The style gives a strong identity to Mar del Plata's urban environment and marks Mar del Plata's transition from a seasonal resort town into a permanent city. [32]
Mar del Plata is a city on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean, in Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. It is the seat of General Pueyrredón district. Mar del Plata is the second largest city in Buenos Aires Province. The name "Mar del Plata" is a shortening of "Mar del Rio de la Plata," and has the meaning of "sea of the Rio de la Plata basin" or "adjoining sea to the (River) Plate region". Mar del Plata is one of the major fishing ports and the biggest seaside beach resort in Argentina. With a population of 682,605 as per the 2022 census [INDEC], it is the 5th largest city in Argentina.
The Kavanagh Building is a residential skyscraper in Retiro, Buenos Aires, Argentina. Designed in 1934 by architects Gregorio Sánchez, Ernesto Lagos and Luis María de la Torre, it is considered a pinnacle of modernist architecture. At the time of its inauguration in 1936, the Kavanagh was the tallest building in Latin America surpassing the Palacio Salvo built in Montevideo, Uruguay in 1928, as well as the tallest building in the world with a reinforced concrete structure.
Antonio Palacios Ramilo was a Spanish architect. Distinguished by the monumental eclecticism he left as imprint in many of his projects, he helped define the architectural identity of Madrid in the first half of the 20th century.
The architecture of Argentina can be said to start at the beginning of the Spanish colonisation, though it was in the 18th century that the cities of the country reached their splendour. Cities like Córdoba, Salta, Mendoza, and also Buenos Aires conserved most their historical Spanish colonial architecture in spite of their urban growth.
Club Atlético Quilmes is a sports club based in Mar del Plata, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. Although other sports are practised in the club, Quilmes is mostly known for its basketball team, which currently plays in the Liga Nacional de Básquet, the top division of Argentine league system.
Alejandro Bustillo was an Argentine painter and architect who designed numerous buildings including iconic landmarks in Buenos Aires, Mar del Plata, and Bariloche.
Amancio Williams was an Argentine architect. He is among his country's leading exponents of modern architecture.
Patricio Peralta Ramos was an Argentine businessman and landowner prominent in the foundation of the seaside city of Mar del Plata.
Club Atlético Unión de Mar del Plata is an Argentine sports club from Mar del Plata, Buenos Aires Province. The club was founded on December 1, 1926, and its main sports are football and basketball. In football, Unión currently plays in the Torneo Argentino A, which is the regionalised third division of the Argentine football league system.
The Mar del Plata Rugby Union, abbreviated URMDP, is the organisational body that rules the game of rugby union in Mar del Plata town and cities of the south of Buenos Aires Province. The stadium of Villa Marista is used for rugby matches played by the Union representative side.
Marina Kitroser de Waisman was an Argentine architect, critic, and writer. She was awarded the Premio América in 1987.
Matilde Ucelay Maortúa was the first woman licensed in architecture in Spain. She was awarded the Premio Nacional de Arquitectura de España in 2004.
Carmen Espegel Alonso, is a Doctor of Architecture at the Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura de Madrid (Spain), where she teaches Architectural Project classes representing the Espegel Teaching Unit. She has been working at her own studio since 1985 and in 2003 she founded the firm espegel-fisac arquitectos. Her reference work, "Heroines of Space. Women Architects in the Modern Movement", is a theoretical and historical synthesis of the role of women in Architecture.
The Bristol Hotel was a luxury hotel in Mar del Plata, Argentina. At one time it was patronised by the elite of Buenos Aires. Later it became run down, and in 1944 it was sold, subdivided and rented the premises for commercial use. The hotel building was torn down in 1974. The name survives in the Playa Bristol, the most popular beach in Mar del Plata.
Carmen Córdova (1929–2011) was an Argentine architect who was part of the Modern Architecture Organization (OAM). In 1994 she became the first woman dean of the Faculty of Architecture, Design, and Urban Planning at the University of Buenos Aires. In 2004, she received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Fondo Nacional de las Artes.
Canal 8 Mar del Plata is a television station broadcasting on channel 8 in Mar del Plata, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. It carries programs from Telefe and is owned by Grupo Neomedia.
The Ariston Club is a building in Mar del Plata, Argentina designed by Marcel Breuer. It is part of the Modern Movement, and complies with four of the five Le Corbusier's Points of Architecture: pilotis, free designing of the floor plan, free designing of the façade, horizontal windows.
Noemí Goytia is an Argentine architect and professor specialized in history, criticism, heritage and project processes. She has received the CICOP Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Center for Heritage Conservation in 2014. She is the author of numerous books and magazine articles on her specialty.
The Faculty of Architecture, Design and Urbanism is a faculty of the University of Buenos Aires (UBA), the largest university in Argentina. Established in 1901 as the School of Architecture, it has since expanded to impart courses on graphic design and urbanism.
