Mies Van der Rohe Chair

In 2010, the Fundació Mies van der Rohe and the Universitat Politècnica de Barcelona re-established the Càtedra Mies van der Rohe academic programme. This programme is envisaged to continue in the 2010-2011 academic year with a focus on two areas: the study of social housing and Mediterranean cities.

The first research group, which examines the issue of social housing, will be directed by Ignacio Paricio Ansuategui, a full professor at the Superior Technical School of Architecture. This group will be centring its research on social housing and innovation in construction techniques. Customised prefabrication will be approached as an innovative solution for the development of industrialised construction systems. This group aspires to combine the application of prefabricated systems with the specific and individualised construction of each building, thus enabling the adaptation of prefabricated systems to architectural projects of all sorts. The results of this work will also serve in the area of housing refurbishment. This course will be given in cooperation with the IMAT and the Municipal Housing Board.

The second research group, titled Ciutats Mediterrànies (Mediterranean Cities) and directed by Eduard Bru Bistuer, a professor at the Superior Technical School of Architecture, will examine cases of Mediterranean cities as both the basis of and a contribution to envisaged courses and workshops with other international institutions and universities.

The aim of the programme is to analyse different Mediterranean cities and the issues they commonly face, such as:

  - The need to update transport infrastructures, and particularly those of land transport, through technological innovation.

  - The common challenge of capital cities in pinpointing high-yield and generally short-term investments, in order to create a city rather than spaces that act like parasites of the urban structure in terms of commercial accessibility and ease.

  - The priority of solving the housing problem for groups that form part of large migratory movements due to conflicts or changes in the agrarian production system.

The aim of the Ciutats Mediterrànies programme is to analyse the different cities and the problems they share in common, in order to develop proposals for feasible solutions and to create new perspectives and debates on the cities. The idea is to create a tool for an understanding of the city studied, as a source of ideas for other urban scenarios. This course hopes to draw on the experience accumulated in most of the transformation and adaptation processes of the Mediterranean city, in keeping with explicit principles of performance that may serve as a base for future performance protocols.

In a word, this research programme takes into consideration the history and culture of Mediterranean cities as a point of departure, for the subsequent study of their future challenges and opportunities. The programme sets out to address the cities as a set of constructive systems, structures, uses, cultural practices and institutions, and will examine the urban and regional conditions that make up an interconnected system of Mediterranean regions.