Chacarita Moderna: The Brutalist Necropolis of Buenos Aires recovers the Sexto Panteón — a subterranean city of 150,000 burial plots beneath Buenos Aires — and the largely overlooked architect who conceived it, through feminist critique and architectural investigation.
About This Book
Launched in 1949, the Sexto Panteón is the first and largest application of modernist architecture to funerary design — a brutalist underground necropolis that has remained, until now, largely absent from architectural history. French architect Léa Namer returns to this singular site to ask why. At the centre of her investigation is Ítala Fulvia Villa (1913–1991), one of Argentina's first female architects and urban planners, a South American modernist who contributed to Le Corbusier's master plan for Buenos Aires yet whose greatest work has been systematically ignored. This book is both a forensic study of a remarkable brutalist structure and a feminist re-reading of the erasure of women from architectural history.
Key Features
- 224 pages of architectural analysis, historical investigation, and documentation of the Sexto Panteón
- Research and text by Léa Namer
- Case study: the Sexto Panteón underground necropolis, Buenos Aires, and the work of Ítala Fulvia Villa
- Published by Building Books, 2024
What You'll Discover
- The architectural logic and brutalist materiality of the Sexto Panteón — a monumental subterranean structure containing 150,000 burial plots
- The career of Ítala Fulvia Villa, one of Argentina's first female architects, and her role in shaping South American modernism
- Villa's collaboration on Le Corbusier's master plan for Buenos Aires and what her contribution reveals about modernism's gender dynamics
- How feminist historiography reshapes our reading of canonical architectural narratives and recovers erased practitioners
About the Author
Léa Namer is a French architect whose research focuses on the Sexto Panteón and its creator, Ítala Fulvia Villa. Through in-depth investigation, she brings a feminist critical lens to the architectural and historical significance of this unique funerary site.
Specifications
- Format: Paperback
- Pages: 224
- Dimensions: 22 x 29 cm
- Language: English
- ISBN: 9782492680199
- Publisher: Building Books
- Publication Date: [Details available upon request]
Perfect For: Architects and historians interested in brutalism, Latin American modernism, feminist architectural history, and the underrepresented figures who shaped the built environment.