Does Luis Barragán fit into the picture of “Mexicanization”?
geschreven door Dominique Pieters | 18 May 2026
Where Luis Barragán (1902–1988) adhered to the functional style in his early period, his mature work bears witness to a critical attitude toward both functionalism and the tendency toward Mexicanization. As an erudite and well-traveled man, his inspiration reaches far beyond Mexico’s past and embraces southern Spain, North Africa, and parts of the Middle East.
The personal processing of these influences will help him adapt the International Style to the local needs specific to Mexico. Thus he will ignore the premise of transparency and apply it only insofar as the climate allows this—while taking into account the human need for privacy. His street facades are unobtrusive and closed, characterized by modest narrow and low entrances reminiscent of those of Mediterranean houses; they form the transition between the street and the public space and the intimacy and enclosure of the interior spaces. The street facade deliberately, but without pretension, creates a distance from the neighborhood. He varies the width of the windows according to need: darkness, intimacy, a view of the garden, the sky, or a tree.
He transforms Le Corbusier’s roof terraces into secluded meditative patios with only a view of the sky. The open plan is divided by screens, creating surprising sightlines again and again. Technically, he reintroduces the load-bearing wall, while the use of modern construction techniques (including reinforced concrete beams) provides greater spatial freedom. With the striking use of color on the walls, both inside and outside, he creates abstract landscapes that express the essence of Mexico’s natural and cultural environment.
By using water, he brings the element of music into architecture as a complement to spatiality. His work is called “naturalized modernism” and is free of social or political implications. In contrast to nationalist architecture, Barragán sees the importance of history not in its nationalist meaning or as a theoretical starting point, but for those aspects that may be useful for evoking feelings or effects. He invites introspection and a re-evaluation of traditions. As an outsider and autobiographer, Barragán responds to the rigid rationalism of the modernists and moves toward a humanization of architecture through emotionalization, creating experiences such as serenity, intimacy, and surprise. He creates atmospheres that give rise to spontaneous meditation.
For him, the integración plástica becomes the integration of architecture and landscape in terms of nature, water, trees, and land, and this indicates his phenomenological position within Mexican modern architecture. In his autobiographical architecture, the influence of some of his best friends is recognized: the painter of naïve art and collector of folk art Jesus “Chucho” Reyes is said to have inspired Barragán’s characteristic use of color and intense chromaticism; the muralist José Orozco, with whom he shared the abstract side of the Mexican, and the sculptor Mathias Goeritz, whose formal sensitivity he shared, as shown by their collaboration on the Torres Satélite and the Tlalpan Chapel.
Sources
Pauly, D.: Barragán, space and shadow, walls and colour (2002);
Riggen Martinez, A.: Luis Barragán, Mexico’s modern master, 1902–1988 (1969); Luis Barragán, The quiet revolution (Ed. Fr. Zanco, 2001);
Saito,Y.: Casa Barragán (2002).
written by
Dominique Pieters
Dominique is the founder and creative director of planopli. She is an architect by training, author, and architecture journalist for (inter)national magazines. Previously, she was artistic director of Archipel and taught at TU Delft and KU Leuven.
