SUSTAINABILITY


Entry hall and main reception. Right: The hallways are structured around skylights and courtyards.


testimony of simple and proven solutions. Some of these could be the galleries, for instance, a legacy mainly from roman architecture, the thick walls of the Jesuit ‘Estancias’ of Córdoba, or the meticulous climatic analysis that architects such as Wladimiro Acosta condensed in his Helios System, which embodied in meticulous decisions towards its architecture when orienting a building, establishing solar protections, or developing a system of pennant-type windows that generate air currents allowing cross ventilation, so necessary in hot and permanently humid climates.2


All these decisions are based on


experience and common sense, and they translate into sensitive interventions that allow us to minimise the need for artificial thermal conditioning, not by denying it, but by making rational use of it, while significantly improving the comfort and quality of life of the inhabitants of a building. However, despite the lessons learned during the formative years in our architecture schools, we sometimes persist in ignoring these fundamental principles. A clear example of this is the design of identical facades on all four sides of the building, without reflecting on the climatic conditions that could differentiate each of them. This lack of consideration is the germ of buildings with large glass surfaces in hot climates, creating unwanted greenhouses, representative of the disconnection between academic theory and professional practice, in pursuit of what we have misunderstood as a ‘category’ building. Likewise, the indiscriminate use of highly industrialised materials that we see in magazines or that have a reputation for being ‘high-tech’ distances us from the concept of a local economy and the


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importance of using local materials and labour – principles that are fundamental when it comes to achieving more sustainable and rooted buildings. It is important to recognise that, before


the invention of artificial air conditioning systems, the success or failure of a building’s habitability and comfort depended exclusively on good design. This does not imply adopting a retrograde perspective that dismisses these technological advances, but rather re- evaluating design as an essential component to achieve an efficient and sustainable balance. Fortunately, in this context, there are


also architects such as Lacaton & Vassal who take buildings considered obsolete, and through small and simple interventions, such as the creation of galleries around a building, they manage to rescue it and save it from being demolished, generating ‘thermal buffers’ and improving the habitability and comfort of the inhabitants. Or the case of the architect Francis


Kéré in Gando, Burkina Faso, winner of the Pritzker Prize. Upon returning to his community after studying in Berlin, Kéré chose not to impose imported architecture or follow the standards of a ‘super European architect’. Instead, he reinterpreted local tradition, using available materials and techniques intelligently, and involved the community in construction. He valued local knowledge, such as mud construction, resulting in simple but sustainable projects, such as the primary school of Gando, with its functional ‘boxes’ joined by a double roof – one made of clay and one made of zinc, separated by a steel truss that allows for ventilation to prevent classrooms from overheating and offer a comfortable environment for students.3


Later, Kéré would apply a similar logic when designing the library in the same educational complex, building it with compacted earth blocks and a raised sheet metal roof, but with an elliptical rather than rectangular plan, more in line with the vernacular constructions of the region. The main innovation was the use of skylights to qualify the space through light, by embedding traditional clay pots, handmade by local women, into the concrete slab. This system created circular holes that allow air to enter and filter sunlight, generating a dynamic lighting pattern that enriches the experience of the space. All of this was achieved with local materials and community labour, highlighting the importance of adapting architectural solutions to the specific needs and possibilities of each community.3 We must learn that every place has something to give, and just as Gando had Francis Kéré with his pots and compressed clay, each region usually has its own exponents, such is the case of José ‘Togo’ Díaz in Córdoba (Argentina), a famous architect who left a vast legacy of buildings and labour with a strong brick tradition in the city, who learned from renowned architects such as Rogelio Salmona and Eladio Dieste, and knew how to translate these teachings into his long career of work built using brick, the quintessential material that emerges from Córdoba’s soil.


Villa el Libertador Príncipe de Asturias Municipal Hospital (Viale, Dutari, Paz)4 After these reflections, we present here a medium-complexity hospital located in the south of the city of Córdoba (Argentina), in a populous neighbourhood called ‘Villa el Libertador’, which has about 250,000 inhabitants, mostly working


IFHE DIGEST 2025


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