The Houses of Guadalajara: Ghosts of Modernity

(English / Spanish edition)

This book studies the origins and late
evolution of modern Mexican architecture through a series of houses built by
two generations of architects during the 1920s and 1980s in Guadalajara. In so doing,
it proposes an alternative history of Mexican architecture--positioning
Guadalajara as a counterpoint to Mexico City, and putting forward a series of works
and ideas that suggest a new relationship between innovation and tradition.

This is also, inevitably, a book about Luis
Barragán and the long shadow he cast over Mexican architecture. It explores his
early and little-known work as part of a generation of architect-engineers known
as the Escuela Tapatía (the
Guadalajara School), which in the 1920s developed an abstract and stylized
reinterpretation of the regional architecture of Jalisco. Even less well known
is the generation of architects who began their careers in Guadalajara in the
early 1980s. This group took the work of Barragán and his colleagues from the
1920s as the starting point for its own production, resulting in an "echo of an
echo"--a reinterpretation through time of an increasingly distant and abstracted
original.

- Between tradition and abstraction: the architectural legacy of Pritzker Prize winner Luis Barragán in Mexico during the 1980s and 1990s
- Featuring illustrative project profiles and critical texts
- With numerous new photos and drawings

Este
libro estudia los orígenes y la evolución tardía de la arquitectura moderna
mexicana a través de una serie de casas
construidas por dos generaciones de arquitectos durante las décadas de 1920 y 1980 en Guadalajara. De esta
forma, se propone una historia alternativa de la arquitectura mexicana,
situando a Guadalajara como contrapunto a la Ciudad de México y presentando diversas
obras e ideas que
sugieren una nueva relación
entre innovación y
tradición. Este es también, inevitablemente, un libro
sobre Luis Barragán y la larga sombra que su figura proyecta sobre la arquitectura mexicana. La publicación explora su
obra temprana, poco conocida, realizada como
parte de una generación de
arquitectos-ingenieros
conocida como la Escuela Tapatía, que en la década de 1920 desarrolló una
reinterpretación abstracta y estilizada de la arquitectura regional de Jalisco.
Aún menos conocida es la generación de arquitectos que iniciaron su carrera en
Guadalajara a principios de la década de 1980. Este grupo
tomó el trabajo de
Barragán y sus colegas de los años veinte como punto de partida para su propia
producción, dando lugar a un eco de un eco una reinterpretación a lo largo del tiempo de un
original cada vez más distante y abstraído.

Author: Jesús Vassallo
Publisher: Birkhauser
Published: 05/29/2026
Pages: 176
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 2.16lbs
Size: 11.10h x 9.10w x 0.80d
ISBN: 9783035629927

About the Author

Jesus Vassallo is a
Spanish architect and essayist. A graduate of the Polytechnic University of
Madrid (2004) and of Harvard University (2007), he is currently an associate professor
at Rice University in Houston. His work interrogates the problem of realism in
architecture through professional practice and academic research. He is the
author of Seamless: Digital Collage and Dirty Realism in Contemporary Architecture
(Park Books, 2016) and Epics in the Everyday: Architecture, Photography and the
Problem of Realism (Park Books, 2019). Together with Sebastián López-Cardozo,
he edited Nueva Vivienda: New Housing Paradigms in Mexico (Park Books, 2022).
His articles have been published internationally in journals such as El
Croquis, AA Files, 2G, Log, Harvard Design Magazine, Domus, and Arquitectura
Viva. He lives and works in Houston, TX.

Jorge Alberto Muñoz graduated
in 2012 from Monterrey Institute of Technology, with further studies at the
University of Melbourne. He subsequently graduated with a master's degree in
Architecture, with honors, from Cornell University in New York, where he also
served as adjunct professor. From 2011 to 2016, he collaborated at Luis Aldrete's
architecture studio in Guadalajara. Since 2018, he has taught at Instituto
Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey, Campus Guadalajara, along
with directing JAM arquitectura, an architecture firm that focuses on highlighting
the allure of spaces through a rational quest for simplicity and an
appreciation for materials and craftsmanship. In 2021, he became the founding
director of ForA, a non-profit cultural center dedicated to the critical
analysis of architecture. He resides in Guadalajara, Mexico.