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The Ariston Club is a building in 
Since 2019, it is a National Historic Monument of Argentina.
In 2019, as the Ariston Club was declared National Historical Monument, a proposal for restoration was started, alongside a
Mar del Plata
Mar del Plata is a city on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean, in Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. It is the seat of General Pueyrredón district. Mar del Plata is the second largest city in Buenos Aires Province. The name "Mar del Plata" is a s ...
, Argentina
Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...
designed by Marcel Breuer
Marcel Lajos Breuer ( ; 21 May 1902 – 1 July 1981), was a Hungarian-born modernist architect and furniture designer.
At the Bauhaus he designed the Wassily Chair and the Cesca Chair, which ''The New York Times'' have called some of the most im ...
. It is part of the Modern Movement
Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...
'','' and complies with four of the five Le Corbusier's Points of Architecture: piloti
Pilotis, or piers, are supports such as columns, pillars, or stilts that lift a building above ground or water. They are traditionally found in stilt and pole dwellings such as fishermen's huts in Asia and Scandinavia using wood, and in ele ...
s, free designing of the floor plan
In architecture and building engineering, a floor plan is a technical drawing to scale, showing a view from above, of the relationships between rooms, spaces, traffic patterns, and other physical features at one level of a structure.
Dimensio ...
, free designing of the façade
A façade () (also written facade) is generally the front part or exterior of a building. It is a Loanword, loan word from the French language, French (), which means 'frontage' or 'face'.
In architecture, the façade of a building is often t ...
, horizontal windows.
Since 2019, it is a National Historic Monument of Argentina.
History
Built in two months during 1948, it is Breuer's only work inLatin America
Latin America or
* french: Amérique Latine, link=no
* ht, Amerik Latin, link=no
* pt, América Latina, link=no, name=a, sometimes referred to as LatAm is a large cultural region in the Americas where Romance languages — languages derived f ...
. Its construction was commissioned by the University of Buenos Aires
The University of Buenos Aires ( es, Universidad de Buenos Aires, UBA) is a public university, public research university in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Established in 1821, it is the premier institution of higher learning in the country and one o ...
School of Architecture, and local architects Carlos Coire and Eduardo Catalano
Eduardo Fernando Catalano (December 19, 1917 – January 28, 2010) was an Argentine architect.
Life and career
Born in Buenos Aires, Catalano went to the United States on a scholarship to the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard Graduate ...
associated on the project. It was designed to promote the sale of lots
Lot or LOT or The Lot or ''similar'' may refer to:
Common meanings Areas
*Land lot, an area of land
*Parking lot, for automobiles
*Backlot, in movie production
Sets of items
*Lot number, in batch production
*Lot, a set of goods for sale together ...
in a nearby real state development.
Since 1993, it has been abandoned.
Design
Its design, which features a floatingconcrete
Concrete is a composite material composed of fine and coarse aggregate bonded together with a fluid cement (cement paste) that hardens (cures) over time. Concrete is the second-most-used substance in the world after water, and is the most wi ...
double clover, supported by four thin pillars
A column or pillar in architecture and structural engineering is a structural element that transmits, through compression (physical), compression, the weight of the structure above to other structural elements below. In other words, a column i ...
that are not visible from the outside—and featuring volcanic lava tiles
Tiles are usually thin, square or rectangular coverings manufactured from hard-wearing material such as ceramic, stone, metal, baked clay, or even glass. They are generally fixed in place in an array to cover roofs, floors, walls, edges, or o ...
—surrounded by wave-shaped glass and wood, is considered to be ahead of its time. It was built using regional materials as well, such as the stone used in the back wall and wood
Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulose fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin th ...
used in the cladding
Cladding is an outer layer of material covering another. It may refer to the following:
*Cladding (boiler), the layer of insulation and outer wrapping around a boiler shell
*Cladding (construction), materials applied to the exterior of buildings
...
and openings.
Uses
Initially, the building was designed to hold a cafeteria and restaurant. Its designed allowed for all tables to be placed next to a window. Its golden age was during the fifties when the restaurant was operating. However, from then on, the building fell on disgrace. Several cafeterias used it during theseventies
File:1970s decade montage.jpg, Clockwise from top left: U.S. President Richard Nixon doing the V for Victory sign after his resignation from office following the Watergate scandal in 1974; The United States was still involved in the Vietnam War i ...
, and, during the eighties
File:1980s replacement montage02.PNG, 420px, From left, clockwise: The first Space Shuttle, '' Columbia'', lifts off in 1981; US president Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev ease tensions between the two superpowers, leading to t ...
, the Bruma y Arena (Mist & Sand) café-bar was installed. Then, the Maryana dancing club followed. During the nineties, it housed the Parrilla Perico barbecue. These uses modified the original structure and downgraded the building's design.
Present day
In 2019, as the Ariston Club was declared National Historical Monument, a proposal for restoration was started, alongside a Change.org
Change.org is a worldwide nonprofit petition website, based in California, US, operated by the San Francisco-based company of the same name, which has over 400 million users and offers the public the ability to promote the petitions they care abo ...
petition. There were concerns about possible structural damage caused by the abandonment and marine corrosion (as the building is located next to the sea), that could impede the restoration. However, a technical report concluded the restoration was possible, as the structural damage was low and limited to certain areas.
References