The Mexico history It is full of architects who have been beaten for creating buildings that break with convention, but that over the years become emblematic and symbolic works without which the urban panorama would lose its charm. It is the case of Gardié building of Juarez CityChihuahua.
This globose hulk, currently in a state of abandonment, was erected in 1988, right on the junction between Avenida Paseo Triunfo de la República and Tecnológico. A point that is not distinguished by being central, pedestrian, green, nor by having the most aesthetic urban area.
But at that point the businessmen brothers wanted it Jesus and Justo García Diéguez. They both planned it to be spherical, because they had the idea of covering it with some material that would make it look like a gigantic scoop of ice cream, but once the work was finished they changed their plan, although we will talk about that later.
With that building in mind, the entrepreneurs looked for one of the best architects of the time: Ricardo Gonzalez. He designed, redesigned, changed plans and adapted everything so that his contractor’s idea became a reality.
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Once the semisphere was ready, they did not cover it to simulate a flake of ice cream, nor did they place any ice cream parlor inside. Finally, they decided to install a business inside for the upper and upper middle class of Juárez: a restaurant. french food.
The word spread quickly. Everyone wanted the luxury of entering. Try the cuts, the drinks, brag that they were there. But almost immediately they began to feel the damage of something they had not calculated: the temperature inside.
The restaurant inside the Gardié building had a capacity of 350 people, but although it was often at half capacity, the heat inside was suffocating. Neither owners nor architect thought that the crystalspredominant in most of the building, would turn everything into a greenhouse that increased the temperature in the hot season and lowered it even more in the cold season.
Soon they closed the food business. It then operated as a bar, but for the same reasons it also failed. Later, a radio station moved to the site, which did not last long. After that the brothers’ building closed Garcia Dieguez permanently, or at least waiting for some project to recover it.
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