Two architects who worked with Gaudí were born on the same day, April 20, two years apart. They are Josep F. Ràfols Fontanals, in 1889, and Isidre Puig Boada in 1891. Another very close collaborator, Joan Rubió Bellver, was born on the 24th of the same month several years earlier, in 1870. This coincidence invites us to remember these three architects who in different ways were part of the Reus architect’s environment, and to make some comments on how Gaudí’s studio worked.
Working with Gaudí required adaptation to his particular method of projecting and directing works, different from his colleagues. The plans drawn up to process the building permits, with the exception of his first works when he himself outlined elaborate drawings, are concise and are limited to the minimum to comply with administrative management. Sometimes the end result was quite different from what was reflected in them.
Gaudí relied on technical drawing learned at the School of Architecture as a precision mechanism to transmit constructive concepts, but he went one step further to overcome the limitations of two dimensions by working with scale models. These were modeled with plaster, clay, wood or wire mesh and contained all the details of the construction that were then measured and translated to real size by means of a rescaling operation. The next step was to develop a three-dimensional hanging model with the weights in a determonete scale, which he was able to materialize in the Colonia Güell church, although he only could finish the crypt. The photos of that hanging model are famous.
When important commissions began, Gaudí relied on collaborators such as Joan Rubió, also born in Reus, who accompanied him in many of his main works, the Sagrada Familia, the Casa Calvet, Bellesguard, the Park Güell, the Casa Batlló, the restoration of the cathedral of Mallorca and the Colonia Güell. He delegated part of the control of the construction and monitoring of contractors in times when work accumulated.
Since 1914, when the economic crisis caused by World War I was felt, Gaudí concentrated exclusively on the work of the Sagrada Familia, which was greatly affected by the situation too. It was then that the Sagrada Familia workshop received young architects and students who formed a new group of assistants. Among them, Ràfols and Puig Boada stood out.
The first was one the the compiler of Gaudí’s archive after his death, and who wrote his first biography (1), a book of great value because it was based on documents that were sadly destroyed in 1936. Ràfols devoted himself more to research and teaching over projecting architecture. Puig Boada continued to work in the Sagrada Familia, becoming director of works. Rubió and Puig Boada did important works demonstrating what they learned with the master, although neither fully followed Gaudí’s method and style.
Among Rubió’s numerous works are the Casa Roviralta , the reform of the Industrial School and the Casa Golferichs in Barcelona, several buildings in the Colonia Güell and various constructions in Catalonia, Mallorca, Gijón, Zaragoza, etc. Puig Boada made many buildings in Barcelona and especially numerous religious works in towns in the interior of Catalonia.
Puig Boada also wrote books on Gaudí’s work, especially the 1929 one dedicated to the Sagrada Familia, not only because it is the first monograph dedicated to this building but also because of the technical content that explains in detail Gaudí’s project (2).
Works by Joan Rubió Bellver
Works by Isidre Puig Boada
(1) Ràfols, Josep F. and Folguera, Francisco. Gaudí (1852 1926). Ed. Canosa. Barcelona. 1928 (Catalan version). 1929 (Spanish version). Reissued in 1952 by Ed. Aedos with an added chapter “Gaudí en 1952”. Ed. Facsimil, Claret, Barcelona. 1999.
(2) Puig Boada, Isidre. El Temple de la Sagrada Familia. Barcino, Barcelona 1929. Reissued in Spanish in 1952: El Templo de la Sagrada Familia. Síntesis del arte de Gaudí. Ed. Omega, Barcelona. 1952.