Luis Fernández-Galiano   The long career of Miguel Fisac is orchestrated here in three movements, linked to the Renaissance triad vis-cupiditas-amor (strength-ambition-love), chosen so that the dialogue between nature and history may cover the three stages of his work (relat

Kenneth Frampton   Fame and fortune are capricious companions to the extent that the one by no means guarantees the other, while innate talent, which is at times a pre-condition for both, is equally rare. Miguel Fisac is an exceptionally talented architect on whom fort

Mohsen Mostafavi   Miguel Fisac’s work never quite follows the trajectory of his contemporaries. Maybe it is the influence of his travels, his familiarity with international architecture, or his interest in a broader intellectual debate that give his work an unconventi

Luis Fernández-Galiano   The road that leads to Madrid’s modest acropolis on the racetrack heights begins in a small town of La Mancha, Daimiel. There was born in 1913 the son of a pharmacist who later went to school in Badajoz, led in 1929 student protests against the depen

Marta García Carbonero   In the famous photograph of the Madrid studio on number 5 of Villanueva street, a trowel and a section of hollow brick rest as paperweights on the work desk. Taken out of context, these two objects succinctly summarize the role of brick masonry durin

Miguel Fisac   Spain   This commission took Fisac on a trip around Europe to see up close the stabling conditions of animals used for testing purposes. Between October and November of 1949, he became well acquainted with that modernity, less orthodox and closer to nature a

Miguel Fisac   Spain   By request of Fisac to the Secretary Ibañez Martín, Daimiel became the site for the first labor institute of Spain, an initiative aimed at introducing in our country the German experience in vocational training. Later on he designed the centers of Al

Miguel Fisac   Spain   A flat and treeless plot – which owes its name to the fact that it was the place where the Crown money was custodied in the fifteenth century – was chosen by the Dominican Fathers to build a school where, aside from studying, the students could also

Miguel Fisac   Spain   Only partially completed, the pavilions of the Teacher Training Center which go up by the highway of La Coruña reveal the purpose they serve by way of a distinct volumetry. The brick volumes that are taken up by the access area, the classrooms, the o

Miguel Fisac   Spain   Among Gardens and courtyards, the Dominican theological center of Alcobendas lies on a valley with a nine meter drop that descends towards the stream of Valdevevas. Conceived at a time when Fisac was thinking about leaving the Opus Dei, this project

Miguel Fisac   Spain   Before the liturgical revolution brought about by the Second Vatican Council, Fisac set out to renew the compositional parameters of his own temples. The desire to “create sacred space in which man would yearn to approach God” is made evident in the

Setting himself apart from the abstraction of the Modern Movement, Fisac combined constructional rationality with the traditions of Castilla La Mancha in his buildings of tile and whitewashed load-bearing walls... [+]

Luis Fernández-Galiano   The growing popularity of Miguel Fisac as author of religious architectures did not prevent a gradual distancing from the Opus Dei, whose founder was also his confessor, though this circumstance did not help to consolidate the link between them. Afte

Marta García Carbonero   More greek than Roman, Miguel Fisac replaced the vault with the lintel. In Spain, a country which shyly adapted to the new developments during the sixties decade, the great spans demanded by the industrial and research buildings served as motivation

Miguel Fisac   Spain   The headquarters of Made laboratories, where he already used concrete as single material, foreshadowed two aspects that marked the architect’s production in the sixties decade: on one hand, the fruitful relationship with the pharmacy industry, for wh

Miguel Fisac   Spain   The reproach of his friend Fernando Casinello for his lack of interest towards the structural solutions in his projects encouraged Fisac to test, in the competition for the church of San Esteban in Cuenca (1960), double curvature beams whose section

Miguel Fisac   Spain   After Anaick, his older daughter, passed away, Fisac was commissioned by Monsignor Morcillo, archbishop of Madrid-Alcalá, and the construction company Urbis, to build a parish center in the neighborhood of Moratalaz. In a residual plot with a six met

Miguel Fisac   Spain   Sign of an optimistic and gradually modern Madrid that spread towards the airport in search of connections with the exterior, the Jorba laboratories came out of the architect’s studio boards when he already enjoyed unanimous recognition. Though the e

Miguel Fisac   Spain   On number four of Castellana Avenue, Fisac raised for the company IBM one of his buildings with greater urban vocation. The protection from the heat of the afternoon sun – a priority for the company after the experience with one of their American hea

Miguel Fisac   Spain   Formed by pavilions designed in several phases, the Garvey winery complex was raised on a plot amongst vineyards in the north of the city, by the road that joins Madrid and Cádiz. A garden that was not completely finished links up the different piece

When the size of the pieces allowed their being lifted and transported, pre-stressed beams were the chosen solution, like in the Valladolid institute, the Somosaguas houses, the school La Asunción or the computing center... [+]

Luis Fernández-Galiano   Being a tirelessly experimental architect, Miguel Fisac moved smoothly from the structural bones to flexible formworks, and he used both constructional methods in the atelier built in concrete by his house in Alcobendas in 1971. In a similar way to t

Marta García Carbonero   The world oil crisis also coincided with the decrease of the studio’s activity; during the decade of the seventies, the commissions were few in a Spain in political transition, where the profession changed at the same pace as the economic and politic

Miguel Fisac   Spain   The Mupag rehabilitation center replaces two houses of a residential complex in the district of Chamartín and is set back at successive points to comply with the urban regulations. Aside from the doctors’ offices and the physical therapy and surgery

Miguel Fisac   Spain   Amongst the dunes of Fuerteventura’s coast, the stout volumetry of this hotel fades with a pyramidal contour which evokes that of Lobos island. Mass tourism allowed Fisac to study concrete prefabrication at a large scale. “It was commissioned by a Ge

Miguel Fisac   Spain   Concealed amidst the thick vegetation of the residential colony La Moraleja, this house protects the family’s privacy behind a cladding of prefabricated white concrete panels. The living room, gathering areas, dining room, kitchen and two bedrooms oc

Miguel Fisac   Spain   Amidst the apartment towers of Madrid’s Barrio del Pilar, this parish center of the Carmelite Fathers asserts its public condition with a horizontal silhouette and a concrete enclosure whose relief shows geometrical patterns similar to those of the A

Miguel Fisac   Spain   Arepeated pattern – that allows to sense the heart and the cross present in the emblem of the Hermanas Hospitalarias order – dominates the facade of this small center for social purposes located in the south of Madrid. On one of the most central stre

Miguel Fisac   Spain   While he was designing an urban plan for San Juan, in Alicante, Fisac received the commission to build a small administration building. To underscore its presence amidst a cluster of apartments towers, the architect displayed a formal freedom which w

This civic center manages to blend with its surroundings through an assembly of white prisms and tinted glass windows which echo the painted bands that characterize the public buildings of this Sevillian town... [+]