Umbrella group

His name indissolubly linked with concrete shell building, Felix Candela (1910-1997) lived an eventful life before establishing a reputation as one of the world’s finest architect/engineers together with Jean Prouvé and Pier Luigi Nervi. Born in Spain and an accomplished rugby player and skier, Candela studied architecture at the Escuela Española de Arquitectura in Madrid, fought with the Republicans in the Spanish civil war, fled to France and was interned before emigrating to Mexico at the outbreak of World War II.

Mexico’s neutrality in the war, its rapid urbanisation, and cheap labour pool was fertile ground for his exploration of shell design and in particular hyperbolic paraboloids. His interest in this concrete technology had been fired by his admiration for the work of his fellow Spaniard Eduardo Torroja. His standard but daring formula of an ‘umbrella’ of hyperbolic paraboloids supported by concrete columns proved eminently suitable for the many market halls and warehouses that needed to be speedily and cheaply built in and around Mexico City. The city’s site on a former lake demanded foundations where the load could be adequately spread.

Pictured is a warehouse for Celestino’s at Vallejo, Mexico City (1956). Tremendously productive, with the technique also applied to other building types such as churches and restaurants, it has been estimated that by 1957 Candela was covering 2,300m² of Mexico City a week with ‘umbrellas’.

Robert Elwall
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