The City Mayor of Bogota, Colombia has decided to demolish the Central tower of the Hospital San Juan de Dios, an iconic building of the healthcare modernist architecture in Latin America. The building its part of a healthcare complex with an eclectic architecture dating from 1918, this barbaric action it is an attempt to the architecture patrimony and exemplifies the lack of understanding and respect for the modern movement architecture in Bogota, Colombia.
The history of the San Juan de Dios Institution start in 1603 when by Royal order of the Spain Kingdom the “San Juan de Dios Catholic Fraternity” are authorized to build the first building later Finish by 1740. In 1918 there’s a first intervention which end 1926 by 1948 this old hospital doesn’t complied with the healthcare, technical and size needs being this the reason to create a new building start the construction.
Designed by CUELLAR, SERRANO GOMEZ, the Central Pavilion its a 9 stories building designed with the needs of the modern medicine based on the Compact Block typology, as an auto sufficient building and resolved as a multi stories building containing new technologies related to the mobility of the patients, the spatial efficiency to optimize the work of the staff and with the required infrastructure. The new project gain the standards of the american healthcare buildings improving high index of efficiency as per the management and medical needs.
CUELLAR, SERRANO GOMEZ was one of the more prolific and important architecture office in Colombia being masters of the modern movement with their projects from small to large scale.