barragan house tour mexico city

• INSPIRATION

Luis Barragán House and Studio: A Masterpiece in Mexico City

The Luis Barragán House and Studio, also referred to as Casa Luis Barragán is a seminal piece of architecture located in Mexico City. The property, which was designed and lived in by the renowned Mexican architect, was completed in 1948 and serves as both a testament to Barragán’s signature style and a museum dedicated to his life’s work. Owned by the Fundación de Arquitectura Tapatía and the Government of the State of Jalisco, the house and studio offer a unique glimpse into Barragán’s creative process and the principles that informed his work.

Luis Barragan House Technical Information

• Architects: Luis Barragan | Biography & Bibliography
• Location: Miguel Hidalgo district,  Mexico City , Mexico
• Topics: Color in Architecture , Plastered Concrete , Mexican Houses, Unesco
• Typology: Residential Architecture / House
• Scale: 2 stories
• Project Year:  1948
• Drawings: © Fundación de Arquitectura Tapatía Luis Barragan
• Photographs: © Forgemind ArchiMedia, © Creative Commons

All architecture, which does not express serenity, fails in its spiritual mission. Thus, it has been a mistake to abandon the shelter of walls for the inclemency of large areas of glass. – Luis Barragan 1

Luis Barragan House Photographs

Discovering the History of the Luis Barragán Residence

Located in the west of Mexico City, the residence was built in 1948 after World War II. It represents one of the most internationally transcendent works of contemporary architecture and reflects Barragán’s design style during this period.

The house remained his residence until he died in 1988. In 1994 it was converted into a museum, run by Barragán’s home state of Jalisco and the Arquitectura Tapatía Luis Barragán Foundation. In 2004, it was named a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

Luis Barragan House is a master piece in the development of the modern movement that merges traditional and vernacular elements, as well as diverse philosophical and artistic currents throughout time, into a new synthesis.

Text by Fundación de Arquitectura Tapatía Luis Barragán:

Luis Barragán’s house and workshop rise on two adjacent lots, numbers 12 and 14 of General Francisco Ramírez Street in the Daniel Garza sector of Mexico City. The façades of this double plan form a single unit facing southeast.

The decision to build the house on a small street in the old Tacubaya working-class neighborhood is one of the first declarations of the work’s manifesto. Despite urban development pressures, this popular neighborhood struggles to conserve part of its singular character.

This neighborhood was composed of modest, small-scale houses, particularly  “ vecindades ,” a traditional housing typology of Mexico City. Workshops, grocery stores, construction material distributors, and small local restaurants complement the house-surrounding context.

Construction of Luis Barragan’s house began when the architect was carrying out the first stage of Jardines del Pedregal (1947), the most successful residential development for the elite in Mexico City’s real estate history. It is remarkable that the same architect who conceived it did not choose to build his own house in El Pedregal but rather in Tacubaya, maybe as a testimony of the urban values closest to his heart.

The house’s main façade is aligned with the street and preserves the appearance of the neighboring constructions. It is a massive boundary with precise openings. Due to its austere, almost unfinished expression, the house would practically be unnoticed, except for its scale, which contrasts with the rest of the neighborhood buildings.

The house announces the dwelling of an artist, and at the same time, its materials speak of an introspective and intimate nature, paradoxically humble and intentionally anonymous.

The translucent, closed reticulated library window is the single item projecting over the plane of the façade. Almost the entire exterior conserves the plastered concrete’s color and natural roughness, where only the pedestrian and automobile entrance doors and the window’s ironwork are painted.

In this sobriety, the upper left angle of the façade contrasts with two planes that form a corner: yellow and orange. Finally, the white tower’s verticality used as a water deposit crowns the house’s silhouette against the sky.

This same gesture, the water tower, can be found at Francisco Ramírez 20. The house on the left side also shares the façade’s silhouette and the central window’s projection in the composition. As stated before, any chronology of the house and workshop of Luis Barragán must stop for an instant in the house next door, which can be considered, no doubt, as a first experimental model or the embryonic state of a project that continues in its neighboring lots. This closeness of two works intimately linked by the same creative process represents a singular case in modern architecture’s history.

The north door, marked with the number 12, was Luis Barragán’s workshop during his lifetime. It can be distinguished by the façade’s silhouette, perceived as a volume of lesser height. Number 14 is the access to the architect’s house.

Luis Barragan House Floor Plan

Luis Barragan House and Studio Gallery

About Luis Barragan

Luis Ramiro Barragán Morfín (1902 – 1988) was a Mexican architect and one of the most influential figures in 20th-century Mexican architecture. He was born in Guadalajara, Mexico, in 1902 and studied architecture in Mexico City. Barragán is best known for his innovative use of color, light, and geometry in his designs, as well as his integration of nature into his architectural spaces. He was also a pioneer in the field of landscape architecture and is recognized for his contributions to the development of modern architecture in Mexico. His works, including Casa Gilardi and Casa Pedregal , are considered masterpieces and are celebrated for their originality and timelessness. His work is often quoted in reference to minimalist architecture despite the use of color due to the architectural ideas of forms and spaces which Barragán pioneered. Barragán’s influence can be seen in many of Mexico’s contemporary architects, especially in Ricardo Legorreta’s projects .

Full Biography | Works from Luis Barragan

• Landscapes of Modern Architecture: Wright, Mies, Neutra, Aalto, Barragán  by Marc Treib

Share this:

Hi, For the 4 grid marks under each drawings, how long is grid in real scale ?

It should be 1 meter per mark.

I just wanted to know what scale the plans are in

Hi Sammy, For images on the screen, you can use a graphical scale (take into account the beds are 2 meters long)

• Pingback: San Cristobal Stable & Egerstrom House by Luis Barragan | ArchEyes

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed .

• * ArchEyes Topics Index
• Architects Index
• 2020’s
• 2010’s
• 2000’s
• 1990’s
• 1980’s
• 1970’s
• 1960’s
• 1950’s
• 1940’s
• 1930’s
• 1920’s
• American Architecture
• Austrian Architecture
• British Architecture
• Chinese Architecture
• Danish Architecture
• German Architecture
• Japanese Architecture
• Mexican Architecture
• Portuguese Architecture
• Spanish Architecture
• Swiss Architecture
• Auditoriums
• Cultural Centers
• Installations
• Headquarters
• Universities
• Restaurants
• Cementeries
• Monasteries
• City Planning
• Landscape Architecture
• Top Book Recommendations
• Top Drawing Tools Recommendations
• Gifts for Architects

Email address:

Timeless Architecture

• Terms of Service
• Privacy Policy

• Luis Barragán
• Half day tours
• 3 HOUR TOUR
• 5 Hour tour
• 6 Hour tour
• Casa Barragán
• OTHER TOURS

​​ Personal tour price

1 Traveler:  6,200 MXN 2 Travelers: 7,400 MXN 3 Travelers: 8,200 MXN 4 Travelers 11,200 MXN

Hotel pick up

Casa Barragán ​

​Return & drop off ​

Estimated duration/day

2.5 hours / Mon to Thu, and Sat

What's included

Private transportation

Maximum travelers: SUV 3 / VAN 6

Admission fees

Bottle of water​

Casa Barragán​

​ Send an email or a message

​To reserve, it is necessary to check availability at least 12 days ahead of your date with date, number of travelers, your city of residence, hotel name and address in Mexico City central area - except downtown/Historic Center-, name of the person registered and the other participants, and mobile number.  

✳ It is possible to visit Casa Ortega, Luis barragán first residence in Mexico City, ask for further information. ​

This private tour is not available until the 2nd week of June ​​

luis Barragan tour

Luis Barragan tour © 2013 All Rights Reserved

Take advantage of the search to browse through the World Heritage Centre information.

Share on social media

Unesco social media, luis barragán house and studio.

• Description

Built in 1948, the House and Studio of architect Luis Barragán in the suburbs of Mexico City represents an outstanding example of the architect’s creative work in the post-Second World War period. The concrete building, totalling 1,161 m2, consists of a ground floor and two upper storeys, as well as a small private garden. Barragán’s work integrated modern and traditional artistic and vernacular currents and elements into a new synthesis, which has been greatly influential, especially in the contemporary design of gardens, plazas and landscapes.

Description is available under license CC-BY-SA IGO 3.0

Maison-atelier de Luis Barragán

Construite en 1948, la maison-atelier de Luis Barragán dans la banlieue de Mexico constitue un exemple exceptionnel du travail créateur de l’architecte dans la période qui suit la Seconde Guerre mondiale. Le bâtiment de béton, d’une superficie totale de 1 161 m2, comprend un rez-de-chaussée et deux étages ainsi qu’un petit jardin privatif. L’œuvre de Barragán associe des courants et éléments artistiques modernes et traditionnels en une nouvelle synthèse qui a exercé une influence considérable, notamment sur la conception contemporaine des jardins, des places et des paysages.

المحترف المنزلي الخاص بلويس باراغان

يشكّل المحترف المنزلي الخاص بلويس باراغان والذي يقع في ضاحية مكسيكو والذي تمّ بناؤه في العام 1948 مثالاً فريدًا على العمل الاستثنائي الذي قام به المهندس في الفترة التي تلت الحرب العالميّة الثانيّة. ويتضمَّن المبنى المصنوع من الباطون والذي تصل مساحته الاجمالية الى 1161 م2، دورًا ارضيًا وطابقَيْن، بالاضافة الى حديقة صغيرة خاصة. كما يجمع عمل باراغان تياراتٍ وعناصرَ فنيّة عصريّة وتقليديّة في خلاصةٍ جديدةٍ أثّرت بشكلٍ كبيرٍ على النظرة المعاصرة للحدائق والساحات والمناظر الطبيعية بشكلٍ خاص.

source: UNESCO/CPE Description is available under license CC-BY-SA IGO 3.0

路易斯•巴拉干故居和工作室

该建筑于1948年在墨西哥城郊建造，设计师是路易斯·巴拉干，它是二战后建筑创意工作的杰出代表。这幢混凝土结构的建筑面积共有1161平方米，有一个底层外加两层楼，还有一个私人小花园。巴拉干将现代艺术与传统艺术、本国与流行结合起来，形成了一种全新的风格。这种风格具有极大的影响力，在当代花园、广场以及风景设计方面尤其如此。

Casa-Taller de Luis Barragán

Construida en 1948 en los arrabales de la Ciudad de México, la casa-taller del arquitecto Luis Barragán constituye un ejemplo excepcional de la obra creadora de este eminente artista durante el período posterior a la Segunda Guerra Mundial. El edificio, cuya superficie totaliza 1.161 metros cuadrados, es de hormigón armado y consta de una planta baja, dos superiores y un pequeño jardín privado. En la obra de Barragán convergen corrientes estéticas y elementos artísticos modernos y autóctonos tradicionales, dando por resultado una síntesis arquitectónica que ha ejercido una notable influencia en el diseño contemporáneo de paisajes, jardines y plazas.

ルイス・バラガン邸と仕事場

source: NFUAJ

Huis en studio van Luis Barragán

Het huis en studio van Luis Barragán werd in 1948 gebouwd en bevindt zich in een van de voorsteden van Mexico Stad. Het is een mooi voorbeeld van de creativiteit van de architect in de periode na de Tweede Wereldoorlog. Het betonnen gebouw omvat in totaal 1.161 vierkante meter en bestaat uit de begane grond en twee bovenverdiepingen, die uitkijken op een kleine privétuin. Het werk van Barragán integreert moderne elementen en stromingen, met traditionele en volkse. Hierdoor ontstond een nieuwe synthese, die van grote invloed is geweest op met name het hedendaagse ontwerp van tuinen, pleinen en landschappen.

Source: unesco.nl

Outstanding Universal Value

Brief Synthesis

Built in 1947-1948, the Luis Barragán House and Studio located in a working class suburb of Mexico City represents an outstanding example of the architect’s creative work in the post-Second World War period. Barragán created a regional adaptation of the International Modern Movement in architectural design. The concrete building, totalling 1,161 square metres, consists of a ground floor and two upper storeys, as well as a small private garden. The architect’s integration of modern design with traditional Mexican vernacular elements has been greatly influential, especially in the contemporary design of gardens. For example, his use of water and fountains reflects Mediterranean and Islamic traditions, in particular Moroccan.

The house and studio of Luis Barragán owes its singularity to being a personal and therefore unique reflection of its designer. This autobiographical background did not prevent this artist manifesto from going well beyond its time and its cultural milieu and becoming a distinguished reference in 20th century fine art and architecture. Of particular note is the profound dialogue between light and constructed space and the way in which colour is substantial to form and materials. It is a house which appeals to all the senses and re-evaluates the ways in which architecture can be perceived and enjoyed by its inhabitants. Many of its materials were found in traditional architecture and, distant as they are from industrial production, they reveal the aging of the house with a patina which the architect acknowledged as the poetic value of his architecture.

Criterion (i): The House and Studio of Luis Barragán represent a masterpiece of the new developments in the Modern Movement, integrating traditional, philosophical and artistic currents into a new synthesis.

Criterion (ii): The work of Luis Barragán exhibits the integration of modern and traditional influences, which in turn have had an important impact especially on the design of gardens and urban landscapes.

The house and studio that comprise the inscribed property occupy two adjacent lots, numbers 12 and 14 of General Francisco Ramirez Street. The architect lived and worked here until his death in 1988 and he determined and supervised any modifications. Luis Barragán believed that ‘a house is never finished; it is an organism in constant evolution’. The value of the property’s integrity resides in the fact that these modifications represent an autobiographic document of the artist and the evolution of his ideas. Moreover it is conserved in its entirety including kitchen installations and the owner’s Cadillac.

The property itself was considered to be in a reasonable state of conservation at the time of inscription (2004). Specific threats relate to insufficient planning controls, increased traffic in the surrounding neighbourhood, and uncontrolled development specifically linked to high-rise construction within the buffer zone. Such development will have a negative impact on the character of the house which is introverted and intimate. It will also affect its visual integrity, in particular views from the garden and terraces. Additional risks to the property include earthquakes and fire. Regular inspections and preventative measures are required.

Authenticity

The House and Studio of Luis Barragán are conserved with great respect, including not only the structure, materials, furniture, objects, art collections, garden and library, but also the kitchen installations. Conservation is extended to the various changes that have occurred over time. In this sense, the property certainly meets the test of authenticity. Occupied by the architect until his death, the house and studio are currently a museum and are open to the public.

Protection and management requirements

In November 1988, the Mexican Government declared the House and Studio of Luis Barragán an Artistic Monument requiring all conservation and restoration work carried out must be authorized by the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura (National Institute of Fine Arts and Literature). The protection of the house was completed prior to inscription and the additional protection of the studio is in process according to the State Party. This declaration extends to any excavations, foundations, conservation work or demolitions carried out by owners of properties adjacent to the monument.

The museum is managed by the Luis Barragán Foundation of Guadalajara Architecture, a non-governmental body that, along with the museum administration and INBA, is responsible for preserving the integrity and authenticity of the property. Since 1994, restoration has been the responsibility of Andrés Casillas de Alba, a disciple and close collaborator of Luis Barragán. Annual work plans provide sufficient care for the property and a 22.9-hectare buffer zone surrounds the property on three sides.

• Luis Barragán House and Studio's Instagram
• Luis Barragán House and Studio's website page

The Nomination files produced by the States Parties are published by the World Heritage Centre at its website and/or in working documents in order to ensure transparency, access to information and to facilitate the preparations of comparative analysis by other nominating States Parties.

The sole responsibility for the content of each Nomination file lies with the State Party concerned. The publication of the Nomination file does not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever of the World Heritage Committee or of the Secretariat of UNESCO concerning the history or legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its boundaries.

• We ❤ Barragan: Mid-Century Modern Architecture Legacy Tour

We  Barragan Private Architecture Tour with an Architect-Expert

 Luis Barragan is a starchitect that needs NO introduction. This tour takes you to the quietly brilliant architectural imprints he left on Mexico City. It is NOT a tour of the government-run  'Casa Barragan'. Accompanied by a BILINGUAL working ARCHITECT, private DRIVER & private luxury TRANSPORT, we take you to Barragan's most representative PRIVATE works across Mexico City. To reveal the textural details of his life, creations and mindset. You can go geeky & ask highly technical questions. Or you can simply be human, & soak up the inspiration. For anyone who loves design, spatial flow, gardens and creativity, this private 8 hour tour is an epiphany.

"Beauty is the oracle that speaks to us all."

Luis Barragan

Pritzker Prize winner, Luis Barragan, is one of the world's most well-recognized and revered architects.

This 8 hour private tour highlights Luis Barragan's most inaccessible and representative works in Mexico City

We take you deep into Barragan's life. The man who elegantly donned English sports jackets, silk shirts, and knitted ties, travelled in a Cadillac, and was known to have his maid prepare entirely pink meals.

Barragan's works have, post-humously, become the pin-up girl for many fashionistas,  but this exclusive tour will take you much, much deeper than photo-shoot fantasies.   ​ ​

Harpers Bazaar traveled a long way for a Barragan backdrop....

Luis Barragan's few remaining works are spread wide & somewhat elusively across Mexico City. We  delight in  opening these  private doors and homes so you can savour his unique emotional architectural legacy. ​

Director of Stylewalk MX, Laura Ainscough, with Martin Luque, Owner of Casa Gilardii  @ Casa Gilardi.

Talk to us about your visit >>

Here’s a quick update on today’s tour: Our guide was incredible, he showed us many unusual places, I’ll send photos when I’m back in LA. He is very knowledgeable, but also a lot of fun! He held my hand to ensure my safety while crossing busy streets. We (sic) can’t stop talking about the tour!

Architecture tour client - Susan Matheson, Los Angeles

ABOUT LUIS BARRAGAN

Luis barragan is the only mexican architect to have been awarded a pritzker prize, the highest acclaim in architecture . he was an elegant, reclusive character, whose love of solitude and respite created a new re-sensitized approach to architecture..

Luis Barragan is the only Mexican architect to have been awarded a Pritzker Prize,  but actually he was trained as an engineer. He never 'formally' studied architecture or landscape architecture. This in itself made him different to other architects and he is claimed to have stated that the only place he felt like a stranger was among architects.  Not afraid of isolation or solitude, Barragan's works honor, and revere, these human needs. Indeed many people say this is why Barragan spaces feel so embracing and sanctuary-like. They often have a sombre or respectful mood. And there is a usually a division between the private self and the public one. 

Though there are Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe influences in Barragan's works, his originality lay in being able to marry international modernism with the Mexican elements of his youth, his parents ranches, and life in provincial Guadalajara. Below is an extract from the book ' The Architecture of Luis Barragan' by Emilio Ambasz

Barragán (above) is often compared to Frank Lloyd Wright (below) for the unique manner in which he integrates buildings into the landscape - as if they were one component. He is more often considered honorably  'beyond classification'.

​ The Pritzker Prize is the highest award in architecture. In 1980 Luis Barragan won the Pritzer Prize , eight years before his death.

Barragan's impact on contemporary Mexican  architecture remains strong. We see this most in the use of color as a counterpoint and the humanizing of design elements. An example of this is The Serpentine Pavillion   by Frida Escobedo. 

Our guide (sic) ranks up there with the best tour guides we've ever had in Spain or Italy. Having had three other tours in Mexico City, he's -- hands down -- the best we've ever had. Why? We felt that we were seeing special locations … not the typical tourist destinations. At each spot, we were the only people there with a guide. Often, he spoke to security to explain why we were there. Clearly a different experience than the hordes of tourists at the more common tourist destinations.

B Armstrong

YOUR GUIDES ARE WORKING ARCHITECT EXPERTS

The beauty of this tour is that it is private. see only the buildings that you interest you. go deep into any topic or theme without 'holding up the group'. take your time to get the right photo. know that we are maximizing your day in terms of travel and attractions..

Naoki Solano is a Member  of the Architecture Faculty at UNAM.

Naoki Solano has been an Architecture Lecturer for over 5 years, so he is a powerhouse of knowledge regarding Mexican (and international) modernism.   He is a Member of the Architecture Faculty at UNAM - Latin America’s largest university and Mexico City's most prestigious academic icon - so we are blessed to have him be your guide for the Luis Barragan Tour. His Masters in Architecture were carried out in Wales, so Naoki's English is impeccable and he is strong aware of Barragan's significance in the wider world from his research into international modernist styles.  Naoki has a fabulous array of insider accounts regarding Barragan's socio-political, design, & philisophical themes, and has himself all the traits of a true gentleman. Both which are aspects befitting the important role of portraying Barragan's life story and architectural approach. PS: Many people ask us: is Naoki Japanese? The answer is: Naoki was born and bred in Mexico City. Both his parents are Mexican too. Naoki's dad, who is also an Architect, was a world traveller before he had children, so both Naoki and his brother received Japanese names when they were born. He was a global citizan before the term even existed!

" Serenity. Serenity is the great and true antidote against anguish and fear, and today, more than ever, it is the architect’s duty to make of it a permanent guest in the home [sic] "  - Luis Barragan -

Roberto Rosales has a US-MX background & has worked for some of the world´s BIGGEST architect firms.

Robert Rosales has the rare gift of representing a bridge between both sides of North America. Born in the US, he has spent the last 11 years living in Mexico City, where he is a full-time freelance architect. He comes to us with a hefty load of hands-on experience, working with some of the world’s great offices. These I include Fernando Romero (Soumayer Museum) Tatiana Bilbao (Jinhua Architecture Park), Castillo’s 9-11 Architecture studio, BIG Denmark (Yup we are talking INGELS here!) and the Danish offices of Hening Larsen. As well as being an architect for ´24/7 deadlines´ he co-edits HCAN - an established international literature journal. (We know, you are wondering how he can have done all that and look so young. But once you realize he is in fact 36, it all makes sense !)

"Any work of architecture which does not express serenity is a mistake." - Luis Barragan -

Juan Ignacio del Cueto is best known for the Felix Candela retrospective he presented at MOMA , New York.

Juan Ignacio del Cueto, who, is a specialist in the History and Restauration of 20C Architecture, is fondly known as DINO by many generations of architecture students, architect visitors and friends. His son, who has the same name, is also known as Dino too! 

Dino (senior) is a very well-respected, indeed prominent, figure in the world of architecture in Mexico City due to his CAM-SAM award-winning research on the architecture of Spanish exiles in Mexico, which in turn led him to become a world expert on Mexico City-based architect Felix Candela, whose use of tensile concrete hyberbolic-paraboloid shells in the 50s & 60s strongly affected mid-century modern architecture internationally and radically broke engineering ground.   

Dino's  'Shells of Candela'  / 'Los cascarones de Candela'  New York show complimented the Latin America in Construction Architecture  1955-1980 show  at   https://www.moma.org/artists/44763 MOMA New York in 2015 .  He was also Curator of “Félix Candela 1910-2010,” an exhibition that was featured in Spain, Mexico, and New York from 2010-2012.  Dino is a member of the National Academy of Architecture in Mexico, and and the Madrid government Assembly. His books Félix Candela 1910-2010 (2010), Candela Guide (2013) y Spanish Architects exiled in Mexico (2014) were finalists in three Latin American Biennales for Arquitecture and Urbanism.

" Life deprived of beauty is not worthy of being called human. "  - Luis Barragan -

Architecture Tour client - B Armstrong

PRICES  : BARRAGAN ARCHITECTURE TOUR

The beauty of this tour is that it is private.  go deep into any topic or theme without 'holding up the group'. take your time to get the right photo. the price depends on the day of week that you tour because some sites are not open sundays or mondays..

8 hour tour (Tues-Sat)

1 -  2pp = US$525 3 - 5pp = US$585 6  -  8pp =US$660 9 - 10pp  = US$690

7 hour tours (Monday or Sunday)

1 -  2pp = US$490 3 - 5pp = US$550 6  -  8pp =US$620 9 - 10pp  = US$650

*Prices are in US dollars & don't include tax. **We recommend contacting your bank BEFORE trying to book, because overseas banks frequently have a block or high alert for any payments linked to Mexico. *** You will need to select the add-on of your  entrance fees during the checkout process because these are calculated on a per-person basis. i

Classic Barragan colours at Casa /Estudio Luis Barragan

Laura was very responsive during the entire planning process. She hired an architect and driver to lead us on a six hour tour of the contemporary architecture in Mexico City. She inquired about our desires of what to see. It was a wonderful private architecture tour!

T & D Gould - Kensington.

TOUR SCHEDULE

We offer this tour every day, but please note the itinerary and duration differs according to the day of the week (due to the opening hours of certain sites).

10 am hotel pick up , 7 days a week

"I think that the ideal space must contain elements of magic, serenity, sorcery and mystery." - Luis Barragan -

Ramon is incredible, he showed us many unusual places. He is very knowledgeable, but also a lot of fun! He held my arm for safety while crossing busy streets. Polly can’t stop talking about the tour!

Architecture Tour Client -  Susan M - LA

THREE ITINERARY OPTIONS 

What will you see on tour will we see private access-only buildings because many of these are private properties and operate different schedules, it  all depends on the day of the week. here are your options:.

All options include a visit to the private-appointment-only house of Casa Gilardi ( as pictured above) This was. Barragan's last architectural work. It was built after Barragan had already offically been in retirement ten years, and represents his very last grand oeuvre.

BARRAGAN ITINERARY: TUESDAY - SATURDAY 

EIGHT HOUR  (Tuesday-Saturday) Itinerary a.k.a The Gilardi + Capuchinas + Prieto Option

( schedule is approximate) 10:00 - 10:30 Central Hotel Belt - door-to-door pickup/travel to Casa Gilardi 10:30 - 11:30 Arrive at Casa Gilardi (MXN$ 300 per person + MXN$500 per person for photography rights) 11.30 - 12:30 Depart Gilardi 12:30 - 13:30 Visit Capuchinas Chapel (MXN$200 per person) (photography rights are restricted) 13:30     Depart Capuchinas 14:00 - 15:00 Arrive at Casa Prieto Lopez (MXN$800 per person/ photography rights included) 15:00 - 16:00 Lunch: Tetetlan Cultural Center – Contemporary MX dining 16:00  Depart Tetelan. 16:30  Arrival at  UNAM landscaping or Hotel Camino Real   (a large mid-century modern building in which Barragan collaborated with primary architect Ricardo LeGoreta) 17:00 Depart UNAM landscaping or Hotel Camino Real 18:00 Central Hotel Belt door-to-door Drop off

Barragan said to Luque & Gilardi. "Don't chop down this (Jacaranda) tree.. We are going to build the house around it."

 When Barragan stepped out of retirement to accept the Casa Gilardi project, it was to build a house with no restrictions, requests or limitations from the owners. It was literally an all-expenses-paid, carte blanche.  And his very last masterpiece. Casa Gilardi is part of every tour itinerary. 7 days a week.

BARRAGAN ITINERARY: SUNDAYS 

SEVEN HOUR   (Sundays only) Itinerary a .k.a The SatelliteTowers + Gilardi Option

Sundays only:  ( schedule is approximate) 10:00 - 10:40 Central Hotel Belt - door-to-door pickup/travel to Satelite Towers 10:40 - 11:10 Satelite Towers view (since they are located in the middle of the road there is a short limit time) (public space with no entrance fees/pictures only) 11:10 – 12:00 Depart Towers 12:00 - 13:00 Casa Gilardi Visit(MXN$ 300 per person + MXN$500 per person for photography rights) 13:00  Depart Gilardi 13:30 - 15:00 Lunchtime (options: @el chef, informal, Cansino + ventanita, ex café Zena <masala y maiz,) 15:00  Depart lunch destination 15:30 - 16:00 Visit Barragan  UNAM landscaping (public space with no entrance fee) or Hotel Camino Real  (a large mid-century modern building in which Barragan collaborated with primary architect Ricardo LeGoreta) 1 6:00 -17:00 Depart UNAM/Park or Hotel Camino Real. 17:00 Central Hotel Belt - door-to-door drop off

BARRAGAN ITINERARY: MONDAYS 

 SEVEN HOUR   (Mondays only)  Itinerary a.k.a The Gilardi + Prieto  Option

Mondays only   (schedule is approximate) ​ 10:00 - 10:30 Central Hotel Belt - door-to-door pickup /travel to Casa Gilardi 10:30 - 11:30 Private Visit Casa Gilardi (MXN$ 300 per person + MXN$500 per person for photography rights) 11.30  Depart Gilardi 12:30 - 15:00 Lunch and visit at Casa Prieto Lopez  (see photo above) (MXN$800 per person/ photography rights included)//  Tetetlan Cultural Center 15:00 Depart Tetelan 15:30 - 16:00 Visit UNAM landscaping OR Camino Real Hotel  (a large mid-century modern building in which Barragan collaborated with primary architect Ricardo LeGoreta) 16:00  Depart UNAM or Camino Real 17:00 Central Hotel Belt - door-to-door, Drop off

Thanks again for such an amazing experience! We had a blast and everyone is so inspired by the passion and talent of this city!

Architecture Tour Ciient - Serena, Nike World Headquarters - Portland 

LUIS BARRAGAN'S DESIGN FOOTPRINTS

It's a paradox. many of luis barragan's works in mexico city were long ago demolished due to utter negligence by the state. now posthumously the limelight is back on barragan.  and it's shining even brighter..

Fashion houses like Louis Vuitton and Longchamp have centered their marketing campaigns on his houses. James Turrell and Dan Flavin have named him as an artistic muse. And contemporary architects such as Japan’s Tadao Ando and Austria’s Mark Mack implement Barragán’s approach

​We were interested in mid century and modern architecture. Highly recommend this tour!

Robert F - Vancouver

LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE & BARRAGAN

 emilio ambasz of moma, new york, described luis barragan as is 'one of the most gifted practitioners in contemporary landscape architecture'..

"I don't divide architecture, landscape and gardening; to me they are one." - Luis Barragan -

Barragan implemented the color green as a color scheme only via vistas such as gardens and landscaping - as seen here in the dining room of Casa- Estudio Luis Barragan. (Should you wish to visit the house you will need to book directly. They do not allow private visits)

Luis Barragan and  Luis Barragán y Alfonso Cuevas Alemán created UNAM's iconic landscaping.

​This, my second trip to Mexico City, was something of a carbon-copy of my first trip … same hotel, same restaurants, same historic center tour. Ramon, like peeling back the layers of an onion, showed me how much there is to see in Mexico City. I can't wait to return!

Architecture Tour Client - B Armstong

WHICH BARRAGAN WORKS WILL YOU SEE?

Barragan practiced in guadalajara for over 10 years. than he moved to mexico city, where now a handful of his precious private and public sites have survived. check out the gems on this tour, casa prieto lópez & tetetlán center.

Casa Prieto is the third house that Barragan ever built and the first one he ever designed for a client.

In the 1940s, Barragán purchased a large package of land cheaply from the government. His concept was to create a real-estate development for sale to the public.   The land, San Pedregal ,was at that time literally a desolate petrified lava field, in the middle of nowhere. UNAM and other neighboring developments had not been conceived of, and the area was socially isolated. San Pedregal became the canvas for Barragán and his colleagues to create an an ambitious modernist urbanization project,built around and into the unique existing ecosystem. Casa Prieto is the third house that Barragan ever built and the first one he ever designed for a client. In the 2000's, so  many changes had happened to the house that it was almost unrecognisable. It was bought by Businessman and Art Collector, César Cervantes, who successfully sought to restore all the original elements of the house's design. After studying numerous photographs, historical documents and local stories, and consulting with academics that specialize in Barragán’s work, ‘Every single day, every moment, I discovered something new,’ says Cervantes. ‘The way the light bathes the walls, the way the colour changes with time, the relationship between the full and the empty.’ We have programmed a lunch stop at Tetetlan, which is a multifunctional cultural space converted from the original Casa Prieto horse stables.  The restaurant is the main attraction, but you can also enjoy their library, store and pop up markets.

The Satelite Towers

Satelite Towers is a visual installation of five towers created for its broad urban horizon. The tallest measures 52 meters and the shortest 30 meters .

Satélite Towers: One of the country's first urban sculptures of massive dimensions.  Mexican architect Luis Barragán, painter Jesús Reyes Ferreira and sculpturer Mathias Goeritz. first collaborated together for its planning in 1957.  It symbolizes the so-called 'Mexican miracle' a moment when in just two decades the country had become top ranking in economic growth.

Casa Gilardi

The famous proposal that seduced Luis Barragan out from 10 years of retirement enabling him to build the 'no-holds-barred' house of his dreams.

Completed in 1976, this was the last project that Luis Barragan oversaw in its entirety before his death in 1988. It was designed to function as both a working studio space to entertain clients, and a bachelor pad for two business associates, back then in their early twenties. It then became a family home for  one of the men, Martin Luque,  and to this day they still live in it as a family residence. The primary consideration in the urban context was a handsome, well-established jacaranda tree, to which the whole house became oriented.

Chapel Capuchinas

 Luis Barragan was openly religious, and recreated the sanctuary of a reverent spaces in all his homes. It was no wonder he delighted in designing these nuns a place of faith.

Barragan not only agreed to expand the Chapel and Convent of the Capuchinas Sacramentarias for free, but also to finance part of its construction. He has noticeably applied his signature architectural styles to this project:  sublime handling of the light and shadow, tectonic use of materials, and a careful study of the use of the space. .  The order of nuns who live here remain under an oath of silence, so it is an utter privilege to be able to visit their private realm, and one we have worked hard to attain. Therefore we ask that you please be very mindful that this is a place of worship when you visit. We assure you it will be a highlight of your stay!

The Camino Real Hotel

The Camino Real Hotel, a collaboration between  Ricardo Le Goretta and Luis Barragan, was completed in 1968 and soon became known as a Modernist Mecca

Against the architecture trends of the time, LeGoretta wanted to build this 500,000 sq. feet hotel so it felt like  'true Mexican culture', one that would would evoke the feeling of a Mexican home and so it was no wonder he collaborated with Barragan to meet this end. No surprsies then that the hotel interior is shielded from the hustle of major streets on three sides and  has multiple interior patios and gardens that offer privacy and peace for its occupants.

​A wonderful experience. Extremely knowledgeable and great access! You’re in good hands.

Patrick - Currency Trader - Los Angeles

CASA MAO IN GUADALAJARA

We can't include this house on tour because it's in the city of guadalajara.  it's a great look-feel for barragan's style and nicely captured by helios films..

We were given a private tour of Casa Giladi by architect (sic) Luis Barragon, and got to meet the owners of the house, see their artwork, and learn about their personal experience of commissioning the house, living in it, and their relationship with Barragan.

Architecture client - Andrew - Harvard Uni

BACK TO TOP OF PAGE >>

READ OUR TRIPADVISOR REVIEWS 

Our professional guides take their  job seriously. there are over 200 glowing tripadvisor shout-outs to prove it.

  USEFUL INFO FOR VISITORS TO MEXICO CITY>>>

Create your own review

CONTACT US

Stylewalk Tour Coordinator   Victor Tristan

  [email protected]

USEFUL INFO FOR VISITORS TO MEXICO CITY

1. Check out our partner hotel list. It is drawn from three years of  hotel feedback from Stylewalk clients.

Where you stay in Mexico City can make a HUGE difference to your stay.  Many people think the Frida Kahlo neighbourhood of Coyoacan is the epi-center of CDMX. Logistically speaking, nothing could be further from the truth!  We have partnered with the bnbs and hotels that our tour guests consider to be fantastic Mexico City accomodation options  - be it for mid or upscale budgets.

2. Gay marriage is legal in CDMX. And we are a LGBTI friendly company. 

We are a LGBTI  friendly company. Every sexual, religious, or political orientation is welcome on tour with us. We only work with tour guides who naturally relate well to new people and different lifestyles.. Our guides are openminded, cosmopolitan people, who know that colour and diversity make the world a better place!

Clients Mario & Patrick - what can we say.....we LOVE your style!

3.  Stylewalk does NOT accept any third party commissions from any restaurants or shops. Though BEWARE, many companies do . 

We are travellers too and have been on tours in foreign parts of the world where it is obvious that the guide in cohoots with a shop or restaurant for tourist patronage. The experience is horrid. We don't want to be on tours like that so accordingly we only work with guides who are 100% free of shams and paybacks . Read more here...

.3.  Stylewalk does NOT accept any third party commissions from any restaurants or shops. 

4. Giving back. Being socially responsible is built into Stylewalk's business model.

Aside from directly supporting the best local Mexican businesses, a percentage of your tour payment goes directly to sustainable development projects.  Read more here...

5. FAQs: essential travel & safety tips 

Have questions about  estimating traffic travel times, currency, airport pick up/drop off, tour refunds or safety in Mexico City???   Check our  common visitor FAQs.

6. The weather is not quite what you might imagine! It rains a lot and o ur altitude is 2,259 metres/7,411 feet! Think a little higher than Kabul, Afghanistan and you'll get the picture....

Check the   annual weather chart  for Mexico City !

Museo Casa Luis Barragan

Top ways to experience nearby attractions

Most Recent: Reviews ordered by most recent publish date in descending order.

Detailed Reviews: Reviews ordered by recency and descriptiveness of user-identified themes such as wait time, length of visit, general tips, and location information.

Also popular with travelers

Museo Casa Luis Barragan - All You Need to Know BEFORE You Go (2024)

Museo Casa Luis Barragán

Price & Hours

• Facilities 4.0
• Atmosphere 3.5

Luis Barragán was a prominent Mexican architect renowned for his modernist style, and his former home – which was first constructed in 1947 and now functions as a museum – is one of the finest examples of his work. The museum is an off-the-beaten-path attraction that travelers say will please all, even those not schooled in architectural history. The house is known for its vivid colors, brilliant use of natural light and its impressive garden with a maze of corridors and trees. In 2004, it was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

Recent visitors said the history of the house, in addition to its interesting architecture, is captivating. However, a handful of recent reviewers were disappointed with the ticket reservation process. To visit, you must book a self-guided or guided tour (available in Spanish and English). Self-guided visits are only available on Thursdays at select times. Tickets for self-guided tours cost 450 Mexican pesos (about $26) per person (note that children 12 and younger are not permitted in the house). Guided tours are available at select times Monday through Wednesday, Friday and Saturday Tickets for guided tours cost more. Tickets are released every Tuesday at noon (Mexico City time).  

The museum is open every day except Sunday. You'll find the Casa Luis Barragan located just off the Constituyentes metro stop on the orange line. For more information, head to the house's website .

Popular Tours

Hot Air Balloon Flight over Teotihuacan, from Mexico City

(1788 reviews)

from $ 165.63

Balloon flight with pick up in CDMX + Breakfast in a natural cave

(936 reviews)

from $ 177.90

Balloon flight in Teotihuacán + Pick up CDMX + Breakfast in cave.

(678 reviews)

from $ 171.70

More Best Things To Do in Mexico City

#1 Museo Nacional de Antropología

Located within the sprawling Chapultepec Forest , the Museo Nacional de Antropología (National Museum of Anthropology) showcases artifacts from Mexico's pre-Columbian era, dating from about 100 B.C. to A.D. 1521. Housed within the facility’s 22 rooms are artifacts, including the famous Aztec Calendar Stone, known as Piedra del Sol, as well as the ancient statue of Xochipilli, the Aztec god of art, games, beauty, dance and maize (among others). The museum offers a look at how tradition, culture and life were formed in all regions of Mexico, and it also educates visitors on how Mexico’s indigenous descendants live today. 

Past visitors said this is a must-see if you’re interested in the ancient cultures of Mexico/Mesoamerica. Reviewers appreciated that the explanatory text features English translations. The museum is so extensive that many travelers said you can spend a whole day exploring the many collections and exhibits and recommend giving yourself plenty of time to visit. As one of the largest and most visited museums in Mexico, the grounds are also home to a gift shop, a cafeteria and the National Library of Anthropology and History. 

Explore More of Mexico City

Things To Do

Best Hotels

You might also like

San Miguel de Allende

# 4 in  Best Cheap Couples Getaways for 2024

# 10 in  Best Cheap Mexico Vacations

Guadalajara

If you make a purchase from our site, we may earn a commission. This does not affect the quality or independence of our editorial content.

Recommended

The 28 Best Water Parks in the U.S. for 2024

Holly Johnson|Timothy J. Forster May 8, 2024

The 18 Best Napa Valley Wineries to Visit in 2024

Lyn Mettler|Sharael Kolberg April 23, 2024

The 25 Best Beaches on the East Coast for 2024

Timothy J. Forster|Sharael Kolberg April 19, 2024

The 50 Best Hotels in the USA 2024

Christina Maggitas February 6, 2024

The 32 Most Famous Landmarks in the World

Gwen Pratesi|Timothy J. Forster February 1, 2024

9 Top All-Inclusive Resorts in Florida for 2024

Gwen Pratesi|Amanda Norcross January 5, 2024

24 Top All-Inclusive Resorts in the U.S. for 2024

Erin Evans January 4, 2024

26 Top Adults-Only All-Inclusive Resorts for 2024

Zach Watson December 28, 2023

Solo Vacations: The 36 Best Places to Travel Alone in 2024

Lyn Mettler|Erin Vasta December 22, 2023

26 Cheap Beach Vacations for Travelers on a Budget

Kyle McCarthy|Sharael Kolberg December 4, 2023

• Australia & Asia Pacific
• Central America & Caribbean
• Middle East
• North America
• South America
• Sustainable Tourism
• Inspiration
• Travel Tips

Visit the Luis Barragán House and Studio in Mexico City

There are several UNESCO World Heritage sites around Mexico City that are easy to visit. This guide to the Luis Barragan House in Mexico City will help you add this gorgeous location to your itinerary.

Visiting the Luis Barragán House and Studio

In order to see the museum an  advance reservation  is highly recommended. Tours are small and sell out quickly. It is also imperative that guests arrive on time to be allowed on the tour. The location of his house and studio is in the nondescript Daniel Garza sector of Mexico. Since this neighborhood is still a working class neighborhood, there is not really any street parking available. When I visited I called an UBER and it worked out great.

Photographing at this UNESCO World Heritage site

Make the best of an unknown situation, it all worked out in the end, related posts.

7 wonders of the modern world are UNESCO World Heritage Sites too

UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Mexico

Leave a reply cancel reply.

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

Find it on the map

Top Stories

Subscribe to our mailing list

Advertisement.

Last updated: June 04, 2017

McCadams Creative, LLC (“us”, “we”, or “our”) operates the https://www.globalheritagetravel.com website (the “Service”).

This page informs you of our policies regarding the collection, use and disclosure of Personal Information when you use our Service.

We will not use or share your information with anyone except as described in this Privacy Policy.

We use your Personal Information for providing and improving the Service. By using the Service, you agree to the collection and use of information in accordance with this policy.

Information Collection And Use

While using our Service, we may ask you to provide us with certain personally identifiable information that can be used to contact or identify you. Personally identifiable information may include, but is not limited to, your email address, name (“Personal Information”).

We collect this information for the purpose of providing the Service, identifying and communicating with you, responding to your requests/inquiries, servicing your purchase orders, and improving our services.

We may also collect information that your browser sends whenever you visit our Service (“Log Data”). This Log Data may include information such as your computer’s Internet Protocol (“IP”) address, browser type, browser version, the pages of our Service that you visit, the time and date of your visit, the time spent on those pages and other statistics.

In addition, we may use third party services such as Google Analytics that collect, monitor and analyze this type of information in order to increase our Service’s functionality. These third party service providers have their own privacy policies addressing how they use such information.

Cookies are files with a small amount of data, which may include an anonymous unique identifier. Cookies are sent to your browser from a web site and transferred to your device. We use cookies to collect information in order to improve our services for you.

You can instruct your browser to refuse all cookies or to indicate when a cookie is being sent. The Help feature on most browsers provide information on how to accept cookies, disable cookies or to notify you when receiving a new cookie.

If you do not accept cookies, you may not be able to use some features of our Service and we recommend that you leave them turned on.

Behavioral Remarketing

McCadams Creative, LLC uses remarketing services to advertise on third party web sites to you after you visited our Service. We, and our third party vendors, use cookies to inform, optimize and serve ads based on your past visits to our Service.

• GoogleGoogle AdWords remarketing service is provided by Google Inc.You can opt-out of Google Analytics for Display Advertising and customize the Google Display Network ads by visiting the Google Ads Settings page:  http://www.google.com/settings/ads Google also recommends installing the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on –  https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout  – for your web browser. Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on provides visitors with the ability to prevent their data from being collected and used by Google Analytics.For more information on the privacy practices of Google, please visit the Google Privacy & Terms web page:  http://www.google.com/intl/en/policies/privacy/

For more information on the privacy practices of Facebook, please visit Facebook’s Data Policy:  https://www.facebook.com/privacy/explanation

Service Providers

We may employ third party companies and individuals to facilitate our Service, to provide the Service on our behalf, to perform Service-related services and/or to assist us in analyzing how our Service is used.

These third parties have access to your Personal Information only to perform specific tasks on our behalf and are obligated not to disclose or use your information for any other purpose.

Communications

We may use your Personal Information to contact you with newsletters, marketing or promotional materials and other information that may be of interest to you. You may opt out of receiving any, or all, of these communications from us by following the unsubscribe link or instructions provided in any email we send.

Compliance With Laws

We will disclose your Personal Information where required to do so by law or subpoena or if we believe that such action is necessary to comply with the law and the reasonable requests of law enforcement or to protect the security or integrity of our Service.

The security of your Personal Information is important to us, and we strive to implement and maintain reasonable, commercially acceptable security procedures and practices appropriate to the nature of the information we store, in order to protect it from unauthorized access, destruction, use, modification, or disclosure.

However, please be aware that no method of transmission over the internet, or method of electronic storage is 100% secure and we are unable to guarantee the absolute security of the Personal Information we have collected from you.

International Transfer

Your information, including Personal Information, may be transferred to — and maintained on — computers located outside of your state, province, country or other governmental jurisdiction where the data protection laws may differ than those from your jurisdiction.

If you are located outside United States and choose to provide information to us, please note that we transfer the information, including Personal Information, to United States and process it there.

Your consent to this Privacy Policy followed by your submission of such information represents your agreement to that transfer.

Links To Other Sites

Our Service may contain links to other sites that are not operated by us. If you click on a third party link, you will be directed to that third party’s site. We strongly advise you to review the Privacy Policy of every site you visit.

We have no control over, and assume no responsibility for the content, privacy policies or practices of any third party sites or services.

Children’s Privacy

Only persons age 18 or older have permission to access our Service. Our Service does not address anyone under the age of 13 (“Children”).

We do not knowingly collect personally identifiable information from children under 13. If you are a parent or guardian and you learn that your Children have provided us with Personal Information, please contact us. If we become aware that we have collected Personal Information from a children under age 13 without verification of parental consent, we take steps to remove that information from our servers.

Changes To This Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy is effective as of June 04, 2017 and will remain in effect except with respect to any changes in its provisions in the future, which will be in effect immediately after being posted on this page.

We reserve the right to update or change our Privacy Policy at any time and you should check this Privacy Policy periodically. Your continued use of the Service after we post any modifications to the Privacy Policy on this page will constitute your acknowledgment of the modifications and your consent to abide and be bound by the modified Privacy Policy.

If we make any material changes to this Privacy Policy, we will notify you either through the email address you have provided us, or by placing a prominent notice on our website.

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us.

• About Our Tours
• TTB’S Mexico Blog

• Your E-mail
• Select a Type of Tour Select a Type of Tour I have a question regarding a City Tour I have a question regarding a Getaway or Road Trip I am interested in one of your cars for a wedding
• Phone Number
• Start Date MM slash DD slash YYYY
• End Date MM slash DD slash YYYY
• Number of Travelers
• Name This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.
• Select a Type of Tour Select a Type of Tour Im not sure I have a question about a City Tour I have a question about a Getaway or Road Trip
• Phone This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

The Luis Barragán Tour

The Mario Pani Tour

The Juan O'Gorman Tour

Born From Ashes: The Pedregal & Mexican Modernism

Towers of Satélite & Cuadra San Cristóbal Tour

The Félix Candela Tour

The Mexico City Architecture Tour

The Mexico City Contemporary Art Scene & Galery Tour

Mexican Muralism & The Search for a National Identity

And many more Architecture, Design & Art Tours...

Find your architecture, art, or design tour

The category field is empty

Mexico City Info

Oaxaca Info

Private & small group Architecture, Design & Art tours in Mexico.

With architects, art historians & artists.

In classic Volkswagen Convertibles & VW Kombi buses.

Relax & enjoy the ride: your eye-opening experience is about to begin...

Architecture, Design & Art Tours in Mexico City with TTB

Tours by architects, art historians and curators of the works of Juan O’Gorman, Mario Pani, Félix Candela, Luis Barragán, Clara Porset and more.

Featured In

Born From Ashes: The Pedregal & Mexican Modernism

$225.00 USD p/person

Discipline: Architecture

Architect: Max Cetto

School/Ism: Modernism

Visited Places:

Casa Pedregal (Luis Barragán), Parroquia de la Santa Cruz (Antonio Attolini Lack) & Casa Locken (Francisco Artigas)

Read More >

$165.00 p/person

Architect: Félix Candela

School/Ism: Engineering, Functionalism, Structuralism

El Altillo, Medalla Milagrosa & San Vicente de Paul

The Juan O’Gorman Tour

175.00 USD p/person

Architect: Juan O’Gorman

School/Ism: Modernism, Muralism, Organic

Casa Nancarrow, Casa Estudio Diego Rivera & Frida Kahlo, UNAM and more

185.00 USD p/person

Architect: Mario Pani

School/Ism: Modernism, Urbanism

Tlatelolco, Insigna Tower, Escuela Nacional de Maestros, Edificio Condominio Reforma and more.

Towers of Satélite & Cuadra San Cristóbal Tour

130.00 USD p/person

Architect: Luis Barragán

School/Ism: Emotional Architecture, Landscaping, Regionalism

Las Torres de Satélite, La Fuente de los Amantes, Cuadra San Cristóbal & El Bebedero (currently under construction).

The Mexico City Contemporary Art Scene & Gallery Tour

$145.00 USD p/person

Discipline: Art

OMR, Kurimanzutto, Lago Algo, Proyectos Monclova, Arroniz, Licenciado, Maia, Karen Huber, Lulu, Salón Silicón and Labor among options according to availability.

The Luis Barragan Tour

Northern: Torres de Satélite , Fuente de los Amantes, Cuadra San Cristóbal, El Bebedero and Casa Ortega. Southern: Convento de las Capuchinas, Casa Pedregal (aka Casa Prieto Lopez) and Casa Gilardi.

155.00 USD p/person

Juárez, Roma Condesa, UNAM, San Angel, Tlatelolco, Santa Maria la Ribera, San Rafael and a lot more!

Traveling Blog

View all notes >

Mexico City: Eight Signs of Identity

Walking in the Shadow(s) of Luis Barragán

A New Yorker Story on Luis Barragán by Alice Gregory

LA CASA LUIS BARRAGÁN

La Casa Luis Barragán, construida en 1948, representa una de las obras arquitectónicas contemporáneas de mayor trascendencia en el contexto internacional, como lo ha reconocido la UNESCO al incluirla, en el año 2004, en su lista de Patrimonio Mundial. Se trata del único inmueble individual en América Latina que ha logrado tal distinción, debido a que —como afirma la propia UNESCO en su declaratoria— es una obra maestra dentro del desarrollo del movimiento moderno, que integra en una nueva síntesis elementos tradicionales y vernáculos, así como diversas corrientes filosóficas y artísticas de todos los tiempos. La influencia de Luis Barragán en la arquitectura mundial sigue creciendo día con día, y su casa, conservada con fidelidad tal como la habitó su autor hasta su muerte en 1988, es uno de los sitios más visitados en la ciudad de México por los arquitectos y los conocedores de arte de todo el mundo. Este museo, que comprende la residencia y el taller arquitectónico de su creador, es propiedad del Gobierno del Estado de Jalisco y de la Fundación de Arquitectura Tapatía Luis Barragán.

© Fundación de Arquitectura Tapatía Luis Barragán A. C.

Mexico City's Architectural Moment: A Guide

By Lilit Marcus

Mexico City is having a major architectural moment. The country is producing many fine architects who, rather than leaving Mexico to pursue careers, are staying home and helping change the face of their capital city. One of those architects is Enrique Norten, whose bold, graphic redesign of CENTRO, a university for creative studies, covers some 55,000 square feet. It was done in partnership with Dutch-born, Mexico-based architect Jan Hendrix and features LEED-certified buildings and a public park. The campus reopens in September 2015.

Luis Barragán House

The late Pritzker Prize-winning architect Luis Barragán, born in Guadalajara, designed homes, churches, and other buildings throughout Mexico. His home and studio in Mexico City, on the southern edge of Chapultepec Park, is a UNESCO Heritage Site. Up close you can see Barragán's angular, brightly color-blocked work.

Museo Soumaya

Museo Soumaya , designed by Mexican architect Fernando Romero and funded by Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim (Soumaya was the name of his late wife), is an eruptive, undulating pair of buildings in the posh Polanco neighborhood. The silver structure pictured here is known as the Plaza Corso. It houses the modern section of the Museo Soumaya's extensive art collection. When it opened in 2011, it created a huge splash and is now the most-visited art museum in the entire country.

Camino Real Hotel

The Camino Real , which is also located in Polanco, bills itself as a "Hotel-Museum." Designed by Mexico City native Ricardo Legorreta in 1968, the Teōtīhuacān-style pyramid shares space with bright pink and yellow geometric patterns. It was made as an homage to both modern and ancient Mexico.

Victoria Malloy

Jessica Puckett

Alex Van Buren

Museo Jumex

Down the road from the Museo Soumaya, is Museo Jumex , which reportedly has the largest private collection of contemporary art in Mexico. The jagged-topped museum was funded by Carlos Slim and designed by a British-based architecture firm, headed by David Chipperfield.

Arcos Bosques

Arcos Bosques, or "Forest Arches," is an office and high-end mall complex in the D.F.'s Santa Fe business district. Designed by Mexican architect Teodoro González de León, the interconnected buildings are 36 stories tall on each side (making it the sixth tallest building in the city) and boast a rooftop helipad for VIP guests. Around town, Arcos Bosques is often called "El Pantalon," or "The Pants," because of its shape.

Calakmul Building

The Calakmul Building, usually called "La Lavandera" or "The Washing Machine,” is also located in Santa Fe. Mexican architect Agustín Hernández Navarro named the building after an ancient Mayan city, even though the concept is thoroughly modern. For a long time, Santa Fe was a falling-apart neighborhood on the edge of the city, but gentrification and an influx of industry has made it a haven for new, creative architecture and design.

How an Alien Landscape Became Mexico City’s Modernist Mecca

Mid-century architect luis barragán fused nature with tradition to create a neighborhood that felt both new and deeply rooted in local culture..

• Copy Link copied

Casa Prieto Lopez

Photo by Allegra Ben-Amotz

A riot of bold colors, stucco surfaces, and geometric angles, Mexico City is a design-lover’s dream. Its unique visual language, a modernism made Mexican, owes a major debt to one artist: the architect Luis Barragán. Recently named 2018’s World Design Capital by the World Design Organization (the first city in the Americas to receive the honor), Mexico City is steeped in Barragán’s influence. Even his signature shade of deep pink is now the city’s official color, splashed across taxis and metro stations.

Outside of Mexico, Barragán—who is often compared to Frank Lloyd Wright for the way he integrates buildings into their surrounding landscapes—has enjoyed posthumous fame. Fashion houses from Louis Vuitton to Longchamp have shot campaigns in his homes, artists James Turrell and Dan Flavin have cited him as inspiration, and contemporary architects such as Japan’s Tadao Ando and Austria’s Mark Mack build on Barragán’s style.

Within Mexico, however, the artifacts of his legacy have either disappeared or been hidden in plain sight. Much of his body of work (numbering only sixty or so projects), has been razed in the face of development. His former home and studio, Casa Luis Barragán —the only private residence in Latin America to be named a UNESCO World Heritage Site—is now a small, unassuming museum with reservations-only admission and is little known to locals. To date, just one retrospective of the architect’s work has been held in his own country. His archives are stored in a basement in Switzerland.

But Barragán’s magnum opus, an architectural wonderland long forgotten on the outskirts of Mexico City, is stepping back into the spotlight. The upscale neighborhood, named Los Jardines del Pedregal, was master-planned with input from Mexico’s most famous artist, Diego Rivera, and built on the jagged lava formed by an ancient eruption of the Xitle volcano. In its heyday, Pedregal was a masterpiece; now, thanks to a fervent local collector, it is once again a place of pilgrimmage for modernist enthusiasts.

The Barragán-designed Casa Prieto Lopez is now open to visitors.

In the 1930s, Mexico’s bohemians flocked to the undeveloped Pedregal (Spanish for “stony place”) to photograph, paint, and hike in the fresh mountain air, miles from the rapidly expanding city’s pollution. Artists like Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera saw Pedregal as the primal heart of the country: a wild, remote stretch, untainted by European imperialism and rich with legends of the indigenous people who built their temples there.

Rivera and Luis Barragán both saw the area as ripe for urbanization, an answer to the city’s shrinking housing supply. According to Keith Eggener, Professor of Architectural History at the University of Oregon and author of Luis Barragan’s Gardens of El Pedregal , Barragán approached Rivera to assist him with guidelines for Pedregal’s development. Rivera, who was then building a museum of local volcanic rock in Pedregal, drafted a master plan that emphasized the importance of preserving the site’s unique geographic character.

In the late 1940s, after purchasing large plots of the inexpensive, unforgiving land, Barragán got to work on demonstration gardens, public plazas, and homes that blended seamlessly into the landscape, integrating rough, natural stone into smooth concrete structures and creating vertical gardens for creeping indigenous vegetation.

Pedregal’s homes fused minimalist design with the dramatic aspects of traditional Mexican architecture. Through the use of striking colors, local materials like limestone and cypress wood, and native handicraft, Barragán’s work emphasized place and culture, breathing warmth into early modernist principles. In reaction to the industrial European International Style that predominated in the ‘20s and ‘30s, here, for the first time, was a uniquely Mexican modernism. Related:List A Design Lover’s Guide to Mexico City “This was arguably the largest, splashiest modernist residential development in the world at that time,” Eggener says. Jardines del Pedregal quickly became the Beverly Hills of Mexico City, garnering international praise and the attention of the city’s social and political elite, including a handful of the country’s former presidents who bought homes in the community. It made a real estate baron of Barragán, and put him on the radar of the Pritzker Prize judges, who later awarded him the field’s most important honor.

As early as the 1950s, Pedregal had begun to change. Wealthy landowners began to remodel (and in some cases, demolish) their homes. Huge plots of land were sold off and subdivided, and new developers purchased plots of land and started building outside of code. “Economic pressures forced the subdivision of large lots into much smaller ones, with smaller houses and far less attention to Barragán’s original, and quite central, concern for preserving the native landscape,” Eggener says.

Today, only a handful of the original structures remain. Still, a visit to the quiet neighborhood inspires the same feelings of serenity and the connection with nature that Barragán and Rivera strove for: the curving streets, littered with vivid jacaranda and bougainvillea blossoms, follow the contours of the land, and uneven slabs of volcanic rock layer the high-walled facades, providing just a glimpse of the mansions inside.

And recently, collector César Cervantes has opened two Barragán originals—and by extension, the neighborhood itself—to the public.

In 2016, he bought and restored Casa Prieto López (the largest private residence ever designed by Barragán) to its original state. Cervantes’ home is now open to visitors by appointment. It looks anything but inviting from the outside, but the forbidding exterior conceals a spacious, blush pink courtyard where, in the 1940s, the prominent Prieto López family held high-society parties in the garden. The house’s wide windows frame a view of craggy volcanic rock swelling across the skyline. That same rock is invited inside, rough boulder formations emerging through the soft pink pastel walls for an intimate communing with nature. The sensation is at once quieting and stimulating, ancient and contemporary.

Tetetlán, a restaurant and community center next to Casa Prieto Lopez.

Next door, in an area originally designed as horse stables for the Prieto-Lópezes, Cervantes opened a restaurant and community center called Tetetlán . The dining room’s new glass floor exposes layers of petrified lava, and opens into a kitchen that produces artful Mesoamerican cuisine. A cantilevered staircase leads to the yoga studio and a hotel open to visiting artists, who are asked to add a book to the extensive library in lieu of payment. Cervantes even tracked down tables and consoles crafted from native cypress wood by Barragán’s carpenter, recovering the pieces from collectors and friends of the architect.

Not all of Barragán’s structures have stood the test of time, nor have they received the same care and attention as Casa Prieto-Lopez. A handful of the private homes and public spaces he designed in Mexico City are open to visitors, But while the neighborhood itself may be diminished from its former glory, Jardines del Pedregal’s design was revolutionary, and its impact still reverberates in the contemporary architecture of Mexico City.

WHERE TO FIND MORE OF BARRAGÁN’S MAGIC IN MEXICO CITY You can find bits of Barragán’s legacy all over CMDX. All of the Barragán-designed homes that accept visitors are privately owned (and lived in) aside from the Casa Luis Barragán, which is a museum. Tours can be organized by contacting the homes directly.

Casa Luis Barragán The architect’s former residence and studio is now a museum that features Barragán’s original furniture and an extensive library. Tours can be reserved online but space is limited and fills up quickly, so plan ahead. casaluisbarragan.org

Casa Gilardi The last project Barragán completed before he died, Casa Gilardi was designed for a pair of bachelors with their preferences in mind. An indoor pool in an electric blue room looks out onto the home’s interior courtyard. Contact [email protected] to make an appointment.

Casa Prieto López Current owner and art collector Cesar Cervantes has turned a major restoration project (which he refers to as Casa Pedregal) into his own home, where pieces of his own collection are on display alongside recovered Barragán-designed furniture. Contact [email protected] to make an appointment.

Casa Cuadra San Cristobal This equestrian estate, one of the crown jewels of Barragán’s body of work, was designed for the Folke Egerstrom family as part of the Los Clubes project in Atizapan, a suburb of the city. The home has played backdrop for a number of fashion campaigns. Contact [email protected] to make an appointment.

Capilla de las Capuchinas (Chapel of the Capuchinas) A deeply religious person, Barragán oversaw—and partially financed—the renovation of this convent and church in the Tlalpan neighborhood. Call (52) 55 5573-2395 to make an appointment

Torres Satélites (Satellite Towers) In the middle of Mexico City’s busiest freeway stands a group of five primary colored concrete towers, a sculpture designed by Barragán together with German artist Mathias Goeritz. Av. Periférico Norte S/N, 44390 Naucalpan de Juárez

>>Next: Immersive Van Gogh Digital Art Shows Coming to 13 U.S. Cities