Agustín Landa Verdugo
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Agustín Landa Verdugo (1923 – 3 October 2009) was a
Mexican Mexican may refer to: Mexico and its culture *Being related to, from, or connected to the country of Mexico, in North America ** People *** Mexicans, inhabitants of the country Mexico and their descendants *** Mexica, ancient indigenous people ...
architect An architect is a person who plans, designs, and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...
and
urban planner An urban planner (also known as town planner) is a professional who practices in the field of town planning, urban planning or city planning. An urban planner may focus on a specific area of practice and have a title such as city planner, tow ...
, born in
Mexico City Mexico City is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Mexico, largest city of Mexico, as well as the List of North American cities by population, most populous city in North America. It is one of the most important cultural and finan ...
. He studied architecture in the National University of Mexico (now
UNAM The National Autonomous University of Mexico (, UNAM) is a public research university in Mexico. It has several campuses in Mexico City, and many others in various locations across Mexico, as well as a presence in nine countries. It also has 34 ...
). In 1945 he established a firm with his brother
Enrique Enrique () is the Spanish variant of the given name Heinrich of Germanic origin. Equivalents in other languages are Henry (English), Enric (Catalan), Enrico (Italian), Henrik (Swedish, Danish, and Norwegian), Heinrich (German), Hendrik, Henk (Du ...
, with whom he designed hundreds of public and private buildings during four decades of partnership. The firm's work distinguished itself by its modern language and the efficiency and economy of the solutions it proposed. The work of Landa Verdugo's firm was influential in many areas of architecture in Mexico, including the design of hospitals and social housing, where its pioneering designs became standards for younger architects. As an urban planner, Agustin Landa Verdugo was the author of the master plan of a number of new cities and neighborhoods in Mexico, most notably the city of
Cancún Cancún is the most populous city in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, located in southeast Mexico on the northeast coast of the Yucatán Peninsula. It is a significant tourist destination in Mexico and the seat of the municipality of Benito J ...
, which was built in the early 1970s in an uninhabited island in the
state State most commonly refers to: * State (polity), a centralized political organization that regulates law and society within a territory **Sovereign state, a sovereign polity in international law, commonly referred to as a country **Nation state, a ...
of
Quintana Roo Quintana Roo, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Quintana Roo, is one of the 31 states which, along with Mexico City, constitute the 32 administrative divisions of Mexico, federal entities of Mexico. It is divided into municipalities of ...
.


Hospitals

Some of the earliest major projects by Landa Verdugo were public hospitals for the
Mexican Social Security Institute The Mexican Institute of Social Security (, IMSS) is a Federal government of the United Mexican States, governmental organization that assists public health, pensions and social security in Mexico operating under the Secretariat of Health (Mexic ...
(IMSS) in cities such as Delicias, Chih., and Puebla, Pue., built between 1952 and 1956. The experience gained in these projects would prove valuable when, in 1959, the government requested from his firm the design of a network of fifty-five health facilities in Mexico City. The
Institute for Social Security and Services for State Workers The Institute for Social Security and Services for State Workers or Civil Service Social Security and Services Institute (, ISSSTE) is a federal agency in Mexico that administers part of Mexico's health care and social security systems for fe ...
(ISSSTE) assumed the responsibility to provide health services for its members in 1958. For this purpose, it needed hospitals and clinics that would satisfy the large demand. Landa Verdugo thus conceived a large, central hospital with 600 beds, named Hospital 20 de Noviembre, as well as six smaller hospitals and forty-eight clinics, built after two standard models. The hospitals and clinics included, in addition to their medical functions, pharmacies and day-care centers. According to architecture critic Miquel Adria, the Hospital 20 de Noviembre is one of the "25 most significant buildings from the 20th century in Mexico".


Housing Units

Soon after his work for the ISSSTE, Landa Verdugo began working on ambitious public housing complexes. The first of such complex was Loma Hermosa, in Mexico City, with 1,648 apartments for bureaucrats. The project, funded by the
Inter-American Development Bank The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB or IADB) is an international development finance institution headquartered in Washington, D.C., United States of America. It serves as one of the leading sources of development financing for the countri ...
and inaugurated in 1964, consists of 76 four-story slabs in a large plot of land surrounded by wide avenues and with no internal circulations for cars. Instead, circulations are pedestrian, and large areas are destined for gardens, schools and commercial spaces. The buildings in Loma Hermosa are made of traditional masonry and concrete columns integrated into the walls. This proved to be an efficient layout and structure, and it was repeated by the state's housing agencies in many of the social housing complexes built in Mexico City and other parts of the country during the 1960s. Between 1965 and 1967, Landa Verdugo designed a new housing unit known as Lomas de Sotelo, with 2,090 apartments. He used a similar layout and structure as that of Loma Hermosa, and again included a school and a commercial area in the complex. Other complexes from this time include the Cuitlahuac, Xotepingo and Vicente Guerrero housing blocks, all of them in Mexico City. In the later part of his career, Agustín Landa Verdugo began experimenting with different spatial organizations in his housing units. Two projects from the seventies, commissioned by INFONAVIT, are the Ejército Nacional and Pedregal de Carrasco housing units. These projects consist of modules of six by six meters that are organized in patterns that respond to the topography and shape of lots where they were built. The Ejército Nacional unit, finished in 1974, is of special interest because it was built on an unused plot of land inside a city block. It is one of the first infills in the history of Mexican architecture. This project was part of a strategy by INFONAVIT, the country's main public housing agency, called "Aprovechamiento de terrenos baldíos urbanizados" (Taking advantage of abandoned urban plots).


Urban Planning

The first major urban planning project by Landa Verdugo was the master plan of
Ciudad Sahagún Ciudad Sahagún, officially called Fray Bernardino de Sahagún, is a town in the municipality of Tepeapulco, within the State of Hidalgo, in Mexico. History Antecedents In the early 1950s, by order of President Miguel Alemán Valdés, l ...
, in the state of
Hidalgo Hidalgo may refer to: People * Hidalgo (nobility), members of the Spanish nobility * Hidalgo (surname) Places Mexico :''Most, if not all, named for Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla (1753–1811)'' * Hidalgo (state), in central Mexico * Hidalgo, Coah ...
. In the early fifties, as the country's economy was rapidly industrialized, new spaces for large factories were required, outside the saturated major cities of the country. President Miguel Alemán thus commissioned Landa Verdugo's firm to conceive a new city, in an agricultural valley to the north-east of Mexico City. The commission included the design of the urban layout as well as housing, commercial spaces and the facilities for two of the factories that would operate in the new city. In the late 1960s, Landa Verdugo's firm undertook other ambitious urban design projects. Hired by the
Bank of Mexico The Bank of Mexico (), abbreviated ''BdeM'' or ''Banxico,'' is Mexico's central bank, monetary authority and lender of last resort. The Bank of Mexico is autonomous in exercising its functions, and its main objective is to achieve stability in th ...
, the architect was a member of the committee that selected the sites for new tourist centers in the Mexican coast. The sites that were chosen were
Cancún Cancún is the most populous city in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, located in southeast Mexico on the northeast coast of the Yucatán Peninsula. It is a significant tourist destination in Mexico and the seat of the municipality of Benito J ...
,
Ixtapa Ixtapa (, ) is a resort city in Mexico, adjacent to the Pacific Ocean in the municipality of Zihuatanejo de Azueta in the state of Guerrero. It is located northwest of the municipal seat, Zihuatanejo, and northwest of Acapulco. In the 2020 I ...
, in the coast of the state of Guerrero,
Huatulco Huatulco (; ''wah-TOOL-coh''), formally Bahías de Huatulco, centered on the town of La Crucecita, is a tourist development in Mexico. It is located on the Pacific coast in the state of Oaxaca. Huatulco's tourism industry is centered on its ni ...
, in Oaxaca, and
Los Cabos LOS, or Los, or LoS may refer to: Science and technology * Length of stay, the duration of a single episode of hospitalisation * Level of service (transportation), Level of service, a measure used by traffic engineers * Level of significance, a ...
and Loreto in the state of Baja California Sur. Agustin Landa Verdugo's firm then began drawing the plans of the new tourist centers. In the case of Cancún, since there was no town in the site selected, the city was built from scratch. Ixtapa, on the other hand, was built next to the preexisting town of
Zihuatanejo Zihuatanejo (), and/or Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo, is the fourth largest city in the Mexican state of Guerrero. It was known by 18th-century English mariners as Chequetan and/or Seguataneo. Politically the city belongs to the municipalities of Mexico, m ...
. Both projects contemplated areas for hotels, a convention center, luxury housing, golf courses as well as housing and services for the city's permanent population. The master plan of Cancún consists of a 12-kilometer strip of hotels on a narrow island surrounded by the Caribbean on one side, and a lagoon on the other. The city of Cancún is located on firm land, to the north-west of the island, and is organized in super-blocks with irregular shapes. Each of these super-blocks has internal pedestrian circulations, large park areas and a core with basic services. In addition to the master plan, Landa Verdugo designed Cancún's first hotel,
Hyatt Hyatt Hotels Corporation, commonly known as Hyatt Hotels & Resorts, is an American multinational corporation, multinational hospitality company headquartered in the 150 North Riverside, Riverside Plaza area of Chicago that manages and franchise ...
Cancún Caribe, the control tower and hall of the temporary airport that was used during the construction of the city, from 1969 to 1974, and the first houses and camping grounds that were used by the engineers and construction workers that first arrived to work in Cancún. Landa Verdugo's firm also worked on projects for other tourist cities. From 1974 on, however, these were developed within the government agency that coordinated these projects (FONATUR).


Other Notable Projects

Other notable projects by architect Agustín Landa Verdugo include the French Parish in Mexico City, for the French Catholic Community, the original facilities of the National Free Textbook Commission (CONALITEG) of the
Secretariat of Public Education In Mexico, the Secretariat of Public Education ( in Spanish ''Secretaría de Educación Pública'', ''SEP'') is a federal government authority with cabinet representation and the responsibility for overseeing the development and implementation o ...
, and an unbuilt proposal from 1967 to build a new international airport for Mexico City in the town of
Zumpango Zumpango is a municipality located in the northeastern part of the state of Mexico in Zumpango Region. It lies directly north of Mexico City within the Greater Mexico City urban area. The municipal seat, Zumpango de Ocampo, lies near Lake Zumpango ...
.


Other Assignments

Agustín Landa Verdugo taught at the National University of Mexico for twenty years, from 1948 to 1968. Together with his brother, he presided over one of the school's architecture workshops (Taller 5). Among their students were noted architects and planners
Rodolfo Barragán Schwarz Rodolfo Barragán Schwarz (1931 12 November 2017) was a Mexican architect. Barragán studied at the ITESM, and later under Paul Rudolph at Yale School of Architecture. Afterwards he worked in Italy with Giovanni Michelucci. Amongst others, he ...
, Javier Solórzano and Imanol Ordorika. The latter two worked in Landa Verdugo's firm as workshop leaders. In addition to his architecture practice and his work in the university, Landa Verdugo led the Bank of Mexico's housing fund (FOVI) from 1963 to 1964, and participated in the creation of the national tourism fund (FONATUR). In 1990, Agustín Landa Verdugo received the silver medal in the first Mexican architecture biennale for a convent built in
Huixquilucan Huixquilucan Municipality is one of the municipalities in State of Mexico, Mexico. It lies adjacent to the west side of the Federal District (Distrito Federal) and is part of Greater Mexico City but independent of Mexico City itself. The name "H ...
.''Primera Bienal de Arquitectura Mexicana''. Mexico City: Federación de colegios de arquitectos de la República Mexicana, 1990, pp. 34-37


External links


Images and texts on the work of Enrique and Agustín Landa Verdugo


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Landa Verdugo, Agustin 1923 births 2009 deaths Mexican architects Architects from Mexico City National Autonomous University of Mexico alumni Academic staff of the National Autonomous University of Mexico Modernist architects from Mexico Architecture firms of Mexico