Brick poetics. Old crafts and new specialities

Abstract

This article introduces and looks into the conversations that architects Daniel Viu and Alejandra Buzaglio –both of them professors of the Faculty of Architecture, Planning and Design of the National University of Rosario- had with Alfonso Ramírez. They took place at Ramírez’ house in the City of Mexico throughout a week. They dealt with a broad variety of issues ranging from the academic education of Ramírez to his criticism of the lack of reflection on the project process development which, in turn, was the topic he addressed in the doctoral thesis to be published by the Autonomous National University of Mexico. The architect approached his architectural work defining three stages: the mimetic stage, the geometric stage and that one which was related to tradition. Besides, he analysed the role played by geometry in the efficiency of an architectural work and faced the criticisms of not only Modernity problems but also architectures based on simple orthogonal prisms. There has been a recurrent subject throughout the architectural work of Ramírez Ponce: the constant reflection on the values that should be taken into account for the project process. His concern for the revival of traditional crafts has given rise to space researches pushing techniques to high complexity space outcomes.