Teodoro González de León (May 29, 1926 – September 16, 2016) was a Mexican architect.

Biography

González de León studied at the

Escuela Nacional de Arquitectura The School of Architecture at UNAM is one of the leading schools of architecture and design in Mexico. It offers undergraduate and postgraduate studies in architecture, landscape architecture, urbanism and industrial design. History The schoo ...

of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) from 1942 to 1947. Thanks to a scholarship from the French government, he worked in France for 18 months with

Le Corbusier Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (6 October 188727 August 1965), known as Le Corbusier ( , , ), was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture. He was ...

, from 1948 to 1949. During this time, he was involved mainly on the

Unité d'Habitation {{Infobox company , name = Moldtelecom , logo = , type = JSC , foundation = 1 April 1993 , location = Chişinău, Moldova , key_people = Alexandru Ciubuc CEO interim , num_employees = 2,750 employees As of 2019 , industry = Telecommunica ...

project by

Marseille Marseille ( , , ; also spelled in English as Marseilles; oc, Marselha ) is the prefecture of the French department of Bouches-du-Rhône and capital of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. Situated in the camargue region of southern Franc ...

and on the St Dié factory project. Still as student, he conceived the original concept and idea for the campus "Ciudad Universitaria" of the U.N.A.M., the main university in Mexico and that essence was developed by his own teachers and the great architects of the time. The complex is part of the World Heritage as named by the UNESCO where several famous muralists - Diego Rivera,

Juan O'Gorman Juan O'Gorman (July 6, 1905 – January 17, 1982) was a Mexican painter and architect. Early life and family Juan O'Gorman was born on 6 July 1905 in Coyoacán, then a village to the south of Mexico City and now a borough of the Federal Distri ...

- made important works. Between 1955 and 1965 he planned an urban planning series and made several construction plannings. Colmex007

After 1969, his work was influenced by

Abraham Zabludovsky Abraham Zabludovsky (born Abraham Zabludowski Kraveski; June 14, 1924 – April 10, 2003) was a Mexican architect. He was the brother of the well known journalist Jacobo Zabludovsky. Abraham Zabludovsky was born in Białystok, Poland. He stud ...

. Together with him, he designed several public buildings between 1974 and 1982, amongst them the Delegación Cuauhtémoc, the COLMEX building, the seat of the

Instituto del Fondo Nacional de la Vivienda para los Trabajadores The Institute of the National Housing Fund for Workers (Spanish: ''Instituto del Fondo Nacional de la Vivienda para los Trabajadores''; ''INFONAVIT'') is the Mexican federal institute for worker's housing, founded in 1972, and located at Barranca ...

(INFONAVIT), the Universidad Pedagógica Nacional and the

Museo Rufino Tamayo Museo Rufino Tamayo is a public contemporary art museum located in Mexico City's Chapultepec Park, that produces contemporary art exhibitions, using its collection of modern and contemporary art, as well as artworks from the collection of its fo ...

. From 1984 to 1987 he designed several distinctive buildings in

Villahermosa Villahermosa ( , ; "Beautiful Village") is the capital and largest city of the Mexican state of Tabasco, and serves as the Municipalities of Mexico, municipal seat (governing county) of the state. Located in Southeast Mexico, Villahermosa is an ...

, amongst them in cooperation with J. Francisco Serrano Cacho the administration center. Together with Serrano Cacho, he also designed the Mexican embassy in Berlin-Tiergarten (2000–2001). He also designed the Palacio de Justicia Federal in Mexico City and the

mixed-use development Mixed-use is a kind of urban development, urban design, urban planning and/or a zoning type that blends multiple uses, such as residential, commercial, cultural, institutional, or entertainment, into one space, where those functions are to some ...

Reforma 222 containing two of the 30 tallest buildings in Mexico City, and the Torre

Manacar Manacar is a 22-story skyscraper (''Torre Manacar'', "Manacar Tower") and shopping center in the Insurgentes Mixcoac neighborhood of southern Mexico City at the intersection of the city's north-south artery, Avenida de los Insurgentes, and t ...

in southern Mexico City. González de León was a numbered member of the

Academia de Artes The Academia de Artes (AA) is the Mexican Academy of Arts founded 1967/1968 by CONACULTA for the promotion of Mexican art. Seat of the institution is the Museo Nacional de San Carlos in Mexico City. The Slogan of the Acadademy is ''elevación por el ...

from 1984 on, and beginning in 1988 was member of the Colegio de México.Academia de Artes
''Arquitectura - Teodoro González de León''
/ref> He was an honorary member of the

International Academy of Architecture The International Academy of Architecture - ''a non-profit-making company for performing activities for private benefit'' (IAA, bg, Международна архитектурна академия) is a non-governmental and non-profit organizat ...

(IAA)International Academy of Architecture
''Teodoro Gonzalez de Leon''
and an emeritus academic of the

Academia Nacional de Arquitectura An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, f ...

. He was also an honorary doctor of the UNAM.

Awards

* 1982:

National Prize for Arts and Sciences The National Prize for Arts and Sciences ( es, Premio Nacional de Ciencias y Artes) is awarded annually by the Government of Mexico in six categories. It is part of the Mexican Honours System and was established in 1945. The prize is a gold medal a ...

* 1989: Grand Latin American award at the

biennale Biennale (), Italian for "biennial" or "every other year", is any event that happens every two years. It is most commonly used within the art world to describe large-scale international contemporary art exhibitions. As such the term was popularis ...

of architecture in Buenos Aires, Argentina * 1989 and 1994: Grand IAA award at the biennale in Sofia, Bulgaria * International honorary mention at the IX Panamerican biennale of architecture in Quito, Ecuador * 1994: Grand award at the II international biennale of architecture, Brazil * 1998: Gold medal at the V Mexican biennale of architecture * 2008: Gold medal of the

International Union of Architects The International Union of Architects ( French: ''Union internationale des Architectes''; UIA) is the only international non-governmental organization that represents the world's architects, now estimated to number some 3.2 million in all. About ...

''Teodoro Gonzalez De Leon 2008 UIA Gold medalist''
, April 23, 2008.

Publications

*''Obra Completa = Complete Works.'' Edited by Miquel Adrià. Mexico: Arquine; RM, 2004. . With an introduction by

William J.R. Curtis William J. R. Curtis (born 21 March 1948, in Birchington-on-Sea, Kent, England) is an architectural historian whose writings have focused on twentieth century architecture. Curtis seems particularly interested in broadening the "canon" to include ...

and texts by González de León. Text in Spanish and English. Edition of 1500 copies.

References

External links

* *
Teodoro González de León
at ''archiweb.cz''
Bilder der Werke von ''Teodoro González de León''
at ''praella.com'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Gonzalez De Leon, Teodoro Modernist architects from Mexico 1926 births 2016 deaths Architects from Mexico City El Colegio de México faculty National Autonomous University of Mexico alumni 20th-century Mexican architects 21st-century Mexican architects