Architecture Structure JIANG, Jennifer ARCH 250-001 Assignment # 2
Left: Rafael Guastavino y Moreno (1842-1908); Right: Rafael Guastavino y Esposito (1872-1950)
The Guastavino Family: Medieval Techniques Adapted to the Modern Context
Prof. Pieter Sijpkes McGill School of Architecture
December 13 2014 The Cathedral of St. John the Divine, the City Hall Subway Station, the Grand
Central Terminal, the Greenpoint Saving Bank, and the Boston Public Library are several recognized American “blue ribbon” buildings in which, for instance, these constructions would not stand without the Guastavinos Company and its technology behind the Catalan vault. Ranging from grand religious and government institutions to minor residential and recreational projects, more than 1000 buildings spanning from the 1880s and the 1940s around the United States came from the genius of Rafael Guastavinos, or more accurately, the Guastavinos family: Rafael I (although he was not the first in his lineage with that name) and son, Rafael II.
Known for his pragmatic and formal style, Rafael I actively employed laminated vaults in numerous industrial buildings in Barcelona, most significantly in his factory for the Batllò Brothers (presently called the Clock Building) of 1869-75. In 1881, Valencian architect-builder Rafael I Guastavino and his son emigrated from Barcelona to the U.S.
He left behind him building exemplars for later practitioners of Catalan vaulting. Gaudí and Domenech y Montaner were among the many architects who fully exploited the
Catalan vaults into their works, and furthermore contributed to Barcelona’s identity and political symbolism. Catalan vaults –contemporary practices refer as “Guastavino
System” of “timbrel vaults,” “flat arches,” or “fireproof construction”— are retraced from antiquity practices by the Egyptians, then the Byzantium, the Sassanians, and the
Moslems. Later on, it was generously used in Spanish post-Medieval architecture and in some of the Latin American colonies. During the middle of the sixteenth century, Spain had employed this technique by itself or had merged to stone ribs to form most vaults (ex:
2 groined vaults, barrel vaults, saucer-shaped vaults and domes). Several characteristics such as the cohesive masonry, the ability to construct the framework overhand without centering, and the layering for the bricks or tiles flat were improved by both Guastavino father and son. The methods were native of the Egyptians and erected later within the
Sasanian Empire. Their barrel vaults were seemingly constructed without centering by inclining each successive ring of brick on the previous one to which it held until the keystone settled the structure.
Guastavino’s technique came from Spanish post-Medieval architecture. Benito
Bails in his book Elementos de Matemáticas, following the work or Friar Lorenzo de San
Nicolás, describes thin brick vaults:
“We call thin brick vaults (bóvedas tabicadas) those that are made by bricks placed one against the other in a flat way following the curve, so that its curve is like a thin wall (tapique). Depending on the place of the vaults in the building, they can be made of double or single bricks, which means that they are composed by a single layer of one brick next to the other, sometimes two or sometimes three, never more, as if they were thin walls placed one over the other, the one that is on the top has to have its joints over the brick underneath.”
In a similar approach, Guastavino
system vaults dealt with very thin
but broad terracotta tiles that are laid
“flat” with the curve of the vault.
Usually in two or three layers, these A: Traditional stone vault vs. B: tile vaults tiles are arranged as to cover or
“break” the joints of adjacent
A surface (paper), unable to support its own weight, can sustain that and more if give a slight curvature (Salvadori & Heller, Structure in Architecture, Englewood Cliffs. N.J., 3 1963). layers; in other words, there are inserted in diagonal fashion to ensure right angle breaking of all joints. The joint bricks and mortar forms a homogenous and monolithic material that absorbs both compression and tension. Since these vaults are very thin, it derives its rigidity not from the heavy mass but from its curved geometric form.
However, the tiles are sometimes arranged in rings corresponding to lines of the Earth’s latitude in domes.
Many advantages derived from the result. At the forefront, using cohesive adhesion system rather than gravity-produced friction for stability forms exceedingly light in weight vaulting compared to ordinary stone or brick voussoir materials. Benito
Bails also mentioned “the width of the vaults is minimal because the bricks are placed on the flat side so there is almost no stress, and they are built with gypsum that hardens very quickly.” By exerting little lateral thrust, low-rise vault designs are made possible (1 foot in 10-20 feet ratio). Lastly but not least, the original tiles were made of terracotta and hydraulic cement, composites that are completely non-combustible and resistant to the spread of fire. Heyday, expenses related to timbrel vault were relatively low and inexpensive compared to voussoir vaulting of neo-Gothic, neo-Romanesque, and neo-
Byzantine masonry styles.
On the other side of the Atlantic, the beginning of a new story had awaited the family. With no known precedents of his work in the new land and minimal preparations
(i.e. 40 000$ and little knowledge of English), Rafael I knew his task was to establish confidence in his building system and so he did. He began to dedicate himself to
4 empirical testing at the Fairbanks Scale
Company between 1887 and 1889. He came up with working data on compression, tension, and shear of his vaults. By the end of 1889, he also collaborated with Professor Lanza of
M.I.T to publish a “Table of Theoretical
Stresses” (for arches of 1/10 ratio rise under uniform load). One of the first fireproof tests was performed in 1897, This illustrates the two methods of supporting a possibly after the fatal accident at the floor on a domical vault.
University of Virginia. Reported for the New York Department of Buildings, the demonstration described in details, step by step, the building’s domed chamber; recorded notations of minute deflections in the structure; and documented the change of the metals inside the dome that were subjected to great heat. Indirectly, another fire test was accidently undertaken when a fire ravaged the Riverside Church in New York City in
1928. Trusty Guastavino ribs and webbing composed of acoustic block material survived without damages, whereas the traditional building stone succumbed under the intense heat and shattered: this proves, once again, the invulnerability of the vaults to fire. Following on, an impressive test was executed in
Manhattan in 1901 to illustrate the strong shear
Strength test of tile vault (23 May 1901) (Guastavino archive, Columbia University) 5 strength of such technique. In summary, 56¼-ton load was distributed uniformly on a three-ply arch of a 12-foot span. This test complements his previous publication of the
“Table of Theoretical Stresses” mentioned previously. As the matter of fact, modern single-ply type can support the same load as five times its weight in steel-beam flooring.
On the other side, Rafael I gained potential clients and public interest through publicity and advertisement: a series of illustrated articles where published in the Decorator and
Furnisher, a magazine for designers and builders, among many others. Jumping to another media platform, three essays where published with his own writings on the history and theory behind his building system. One of the trios, namely the longest and most important one, was Essay On The Theory And History Of Cohesive Construction,
Applied Especially To The Timbrel Vault, published in 1892.
The Guastavinos used a variety of means to market the company
Projects and profits were slow in the earlier days for the Guastavinos. The main reason being that Guastavino I was not particularly knowledgeable and risk minimizing when it comes to his contractual liabilities and involved projects. Contributions of the
6 Blodgetts, William E. and his son Malcom, proved vital to the success of the Guastavino
Company. Financial stability was achieved around the same time the Guastavinos incorporated their business as R. Guastavino Company in Boston in 1889. The
Guastavino Company had developed—besides the typical corrugated rough tile of traditional Catalan vaults—structural tiles held by gypsum and improved Portland cement mortars, substitute for the old gypsum and lime binders. Moreover, adding acoustical materials and glazed finish tile to the company’s product line had encouraged greatly their business. The catalyst kicked off when Rafael II, without any formal architectural training, and physicist Professor Wallace Sabine of Harvard, who the latter is generally recognized as the founder of modern architectural acoustics, developed the Company’s first acoustical masonry tiles. Shortly before World War I, the need for such a material had been brought to Rafael II’s attention. Thus, with the aid of Sabine, the first patented
Rumford Tile was in 1914. The kilned tile absorbs sounds by virtue of spongy air chambers created from clay that had been mixed with small particles of burnt peat. St.
Thomas’ in New York was one of their main projects employing these tiles. Soon after, pumice particles filled with small air spaces were added to the moulded tile. It proved to be 60% effective in absorbing sounds. This transformed masonry tile was patented in
1916 and has the name of
“Akoustolith.” Much later work by the
company, such as the nave of St. John
the Divine and the Gothic chapel in the
Cloisters Museum, employed these
materials. The acoustic tile continued it Guastavino tile comparison magnified 7.5 times. Photographs by Richard Pounds
7 ways to become an acoustic plaster of the same name, patented in the 1920s.
Conclusively, these materials gave rise to new and profitable market for the Guastavino
Company that offered by then, structural system with attractive soffit of decorative finished tile with acoustical properties.
Guastavino’s company has worked with the most prestigious architects in the country of that time. They partnered with leading American architectural firm at the time,
McKim, Mead & White, for the Boston Public Library in the early 1890s. This public library symbolized the civic pride and wealth of the city compared to its rival, New York
City. Historian Richard Guy Wilson has called the library “the first public building that demonstrated the possibilities of collaborative art.” Guastavino contributed to the domical vaults on tile arches of the first floor. The ground-floor ceiling are covered with mosaic or left exposed with glazed facing tile. Charles McKim, who led the design for the library, was convinced with Guastavino’s construction system and his vision for the
The Boston Public Library under construction. The elder Guastavino is standing on a tile rib. The project was a boost to both Guastavino and the 8 architects McKim, Mead, and White. whole ground floor. In a letter that superintendent Edward R. Benton wrote to McKim on
March 28, 1889, right after the acquaintance of Mr. Guastavino’s project:
“[Mr.Guastavino] thinks it is a great pity that the whole ground floor could not have been put in by his system, with no beams whatever—only a few girders. He says if we would give him all the iron beams for the ground (already on the ground), he would sell the iron beams and build the whole ground floor for nothing… [W]e are quite favorably impressed with the [Guastavino] system and have quite a bit of it drawn in our sections… it will be decided at once that we are going to use it.”
Additionally, the driveway (now a reading-room) was covered with an elliptical vault of
42 feet long and only three inches thick. This commission gave R. Guastavino Company a national reputation and an invitation to lecture at the Society of Arts (M.I.T).
Guastavino also worked for Richard Morris Hunt, one of the most prestigious architects in the country of the time, on George Washington Vanderbilt’s Biltmore House.
Boston Public Library, vault with herringbone tile pattern exposed, McKim, Mead & White, Boston, Massachusetts, 1890
9 The Company retired during Second World War after establishing a solid reputation through advertisements and major collaborations. Numerous external factors contributed to the decline of their influence; the increased cost of the masonry trades labour, the Great Depression, and the technological advances in reinforced concrete and steel structural constructions, all disadvantaged the company and led to their gradual market loss. As a matter of fact, the Company had maintained an absolute monopoly on tile vaulting in North America during that period and had successfully contributed to the
Gothic revival of our century. To say the least, even though the Catalan vaults lost to industrialized building techniques in the Western world in the 1940s and 1950s, similar building techniques continued to flourish and expand in other countries.
How often does someone wonder about the provenance of architectural structure and art rather than just cluelessly admiring it with a distracted pair of eyes? Structural engineer and historian of construction, John Oshsendorf, published his first work
Guastavino Vaulting: The Art of Structural Tile, in which he mentioned George R.
Collins interest and rediscoveries of the Guastavinos. The beauty that holds St. Paul’s
Chapel caught more than just a pair of distracted eyes:
“As he [George R. Collings] sat in the back of the university’s St. Paul Chapel (1907) during a memorial service for a colleague on October 17, 1961, his eyes wandered to the ornate herringbone pattern of tiles of the domed ceiling. […] This moment of discovery caused Collins to look more carefully at the architecture of the Upper West Side of Manhattan. To his amazement, he found Spanish tile vaulting in buildings all around him.”
Collins, since that day, contributed to the revival of Spanish immigrants that had a significant influence on American building construction. That being said, in more recent
10 terms, John Oshsendorf himself led his amazement and interest on a similar path, furthering his research on the Guastavinos. This professor of Civil and Environmental
Engineering and Architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology directs the
Guastavino Project at M.I.T and has been triggering ancient structures that benefit modern constructions.
Some domes constructed by the R. Guastavino Co. between 1897 and 1911. This drawing became a trademark of the enterprise 11 Work Cited
AUSTIN, Peter, Rafeal Guastavino’s Construction Business in the United States: Beginnings and Development (JSTOR: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1504704)
COLLINS, George R., The Transfer of Thin Masonry Vaulting from Spain to America (JSTOR: http://www.jstor.org/stable/988501)
GÓMEZ-FERRER, Mercedes, The Origins of Tile Vaulting in Valencia (JSTOR: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1504703)
NEUMANN, Dietrich, The Guastavino System in Context: History and Dissemination of a Revolutionary Vaulting Method (JSTOR: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1504703)
OCHSENDORF, John Allen and Micheal FREEMAN, Guastavino Vaulting: The Art of Structural Tile (McGill Online Library)
PARKS, Janet, Documenting the Work of the R. Guastavino Company: Sources and Suggestions (JSTOR: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1504705)
PARKS, Janet and Alan G. NEWMANN, AIA, The Old World Builds the New: the Guastavino Company and the technology of the Catalan vault, 1885-1962 (McGill Library)
POUNDS, Richard, Daniel Raichel and Martin Weaver, The Unseen World of Guastavino Acoustical Tile Construction: History, Development, Production (JSTOR: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1504707)
WAITE, Diane and Patricia Gioia, United States Patents Held by the Rafael Guastavinos, Father and Son (JSTOR: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1504711)
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