LAR F388-Latin American Landscapes

Instructor: Prof. Gabriel Díaz Montemayor

Summer 2019

Assignment 2
Clara Restrepo
EID: cpr665
 Germán Samper: The Street as the most important Urban Space

This paper will talk about the extraordinary experiences of Germán Samper Gnecco, a
Colombian architect who lived from 1924 until his death just earlier this year in 2019. It will
start by analyzing his journeys to Europe, describing the cultural education and experiences that
fed his future successful carrier as an urban designer and architect. This will be followed by a
review and critique of a project called “Ciudadela Colsubsidio” a social housing development in
Bogota, and how it contributed to modernity in creating urban spaces.

Context, Education and Travel

Any conversation about Samper is about urban growth and social housing in Colombia. He
focused his studies in the analysis of architecture and cities. At the beginning of his carrier after
graduating as an architect in Bogota, still very young he traveled to Europe and lived in Paris. He
was an assistant to CIAM (1949-1953) and he was Le Corbusier’s student. Later on he worked
for him as well. Samper also studied with Pierre Francastel, who was a French art historian.
Under Francastel, Samper developed his thinking around housing developments, and he also
influenced Samper’s thinking about the meaning of form and the response of social behaviors or
events and how they are related with the creation of a city. Thus Paris was an important reference
for Samper that he would put into practice later in projects in many cities in Colombia (O’Byrne,
2012. P. 10).
As a Le Corbusier student he was encouraged to take pictures, draw, and make annotations while
traveling in Europe and to create his own method to capture the experience of space. Highly
skilled in hand drawing, he documented almost every walk trying to understand the urban
composition of streets and how architecture conforms these structures made of paths. He came to
believe that architecture should untap the potential of urban life instead of containing it (Samper,
1986. P. 55).
General learnings that became principles from his travel and studies made him turn against
understanding architecture as an isolated object. Instead, to him it was necessary that architecture
have the responsibility to create a city. Of all the elements in the city, the street is the main urban
space since here is where walking and movement takes place. One of his favorite references were
the thin, straight streets from Spain that contained pocket plazas along their way. These plazas
are at the same time both the street and but some sort of steady places (see image #1) (Samper,
1986. P. 167). Another principal he learned was of the grid as a tool to develop cities. He
believed that the character created by the continuity of the block frontage to define the street grid
could be reinforced by repetition of patterns along the block façade, creating the perfect
continuity to the block frontage or damero in Spanish.
Samper cataloged different types of infrastructure or architectures he found at different cities
according to how much he considered these structures were created for a human scale use, which
is what he called “Recinto Urbano” or spaces for human consumption. The recintos urbanos that
Samper found most successful created a roof or shelter that allowed for intimacy in a public
space. He was not a supporter of what modernity created in the city. The modern city was not a
place for humans to gather, but the key component of cities was the urban space for community
gathering (Samper, 2003. P. 152).
He visited specific cities where he learned key components of urban design to create a great
experience of open spaces. The first city of note was Avila, Spain which is a city that influenced
his future designs centered on the pedestrian’s safety. Avila is a place where walls keep vehicles
outside the urban core, where it is only possible to move around by walking (Samper, 1986. P.
21). The second city was Ibiza, where he loved the rural house typology. He admired the
different sizes of volume of these houses, with flat roofs and with color in façade made of clay.
Here he examined a problem of popular or informal housing along with the concept of the unit in
contrast to the variety of design, which he said were “two qualities that are contradictory but
necessary,” with “the uniformity in the detail, the variety in the combinations”.
At Ibiza he acquired a great amount of knowledge that he would go on to apply in the
“Ciudadela Colsubsidio” (See image #8). For example, he pointed out the beauty of contrast in
height, different volumes, and the diversity within a single system. (Samper, 1986. P. 22) Also,
in Ibiza Samper identified traditional architecture as the fuel for housing design evolution, even
though it could also prevent the adaptation of new housing configurations when traditional
cultures do not adapt spaces to the new demands of technology. For example, he mentioned this
challenge when studying how rural housing did not have toilets or any service like electricity. A
final international place of significance for Samper was Japan. He traveled again in 1960 to
Japan and there he studied housing and the city’s configuration. He centered his attention on the
garden in the Japanese architecture (See image #3) and the way courtyards blended religion,
nature and architecture.

Return to Colombia
Samper returned to Colombia by 1953 to focus his work on housing, one of the main issues
facing Colombian people, but with an understanding of the main components that create a city
which are not only housing related uses but a mixed one (O’Byrne, 2012. P. 16).
The colonial legacy was of key interest to Samper when developing social housing. He admired
the colonial architecture as our heritage. He studied Cartagena in depth for examples of colonial
architecture. While acknowledging the humiliation and exploitation Colombians experienced
from the Spanish conquerors, their city planning was the legacy he considered Colombians
should aspire to as a developing country. This was only reinforced when he returned from
Europe to Colombia and found a city in a lot of poverty but also with towers rising up in
downtown. (Samper, 1986. P. 60). From Cartagena he studied the site plans and layouts of
houses, noting the repetition of the layouts but the variety of façade composition. The different
details in the balconies and the conformation of the courtyards would become part of his future
projects as Ciudadela Colsubsidio as well (see image #2).
Ciudadela Colsubsidio (see image #11)
When working on Ciudadela Colsubsidio, a social housing project in Bogota, there was a goal to
create public spaces to the greatest possible capacity even though the project was meant to be an
isolated development with gatekeepers. Trying to achieve this goal, principles were established
from the beginning in order to give a sense of neighborhood and community such as establishing
a type for the gates, civic plaza, hierarchy for streets and plazas, market, recreational areas and
service buildings (See image 6).
The project was planned to be 12,000 units of housing over several phases, covering 321 acres.
The site lay in between two existing neighborhoods, and the aim was to stitch these
neighborhoods together through this new development which pushed to have a transit system to
overcome a lot of traffic. The block grid was very much defined by the architecture (See image
#5). The north-south pedestrian axis with three clear open spaces with roundabouts were meant
to slow down movement. Here he applied a human scale design focus by locating trees along the
primary street, which functioned as a buffer between the residential area and transit (See image
#5).
The language that Samper created in this project included the elements of the urban spaces but
also in the architecture. He proposed details and materials that have created over time the identity
and character of Bogota. For example, he used high pitched roofs for a better adaptation to the
rainy climate. Also, for the top architectural element in the roof he used different forms to
differentiate one group of units for others (See image #7 and #9). So that the block frontage
would not become too monotonous, there is usually a change in the architectural form at the end
of a building row which suggests an entry place (See image #7 and #9). Finally, the masonry as a
floor material in the parking lot (see image #7) gives the street a completely different character.
Kids can play there, and instead of the sole purpose being for cars it becomes aesthetically open
to other uses. The northern block is a townhome typology used for the lower income population.
It has a chez configuration which allows the creation of pocket parks to build up the sense of
community and provide protected areas for vehicles and pedestrian (see image # 10).

Conclusion
Germán Samper had an enormous influence not just on Colombian architecture but in
establishment of modern urban design in the country. His years of experience studying and
working in Europe helped him form strong convictions about the principles of urban design such
as designing for the human scale, creating spaces for gathering, and combining both unity and
variety in design. Samper’s impact came from his ability to apply these principles in a way that
was consistent with and even a celebration of Colombia’s architectural heritage dating back to
Cartagena, creating neighborhoods in cities like Bogota that were both modern and distinctively
Colombian.
 Image # 1

Figure 1.Bergamo: Interpretation of public and private space. Samper, German. “La Arquitectura y la Ciudad:
Apuntes de Viaje”. P. 12.
 Image # 2

Figure 2. Cartagena. The typology concept can be applied through the

entire city. They all have the same layout, but they are different from
each other. Samper, German. “La Arquitectura y la Ciudad: Apuntes de
Viaje”. P. 62.
 Image # 3

Figure 3.Ceremonial garden. Space where religion, architecture and nature are in peace. Samper, German. “La Arquitectura y la
Ciudad: Apuntes de Viaje”. P. 96.
 Image # 4

Figure 4. Mompox Plaza, Arcade street in Mompox, Typical courtyard house in Mompox. Samper, German. “La Revolución
de la Vivienda”. P. 155.
 Image # 5

Figure 5. Ciudadela Colsubsidio, handrawing by German Samper with notes to a side.

Samper, German. “La Revolución de la Vivienda”. P. 173.
 Image # 6

Figure 6. Ciudadela Colsubsidio. Land use. O’Byrne, Cecilia Orozco; Isabel, Samper. “Casa + Casa + Casa = Ciudad?
German Samper: Una Investigación en Vivienda”. P. 243.
 Image # 7

Figure 7.Ciudadela Colsubsidio. Interior spaces. Samper, German. “La Revolución de la Vivienda”. P. 187.
 Image # 8

Figure 8. Ciudadela Colsubsidio, variety of block shapes have contributed to the special character.
Samper, German. “La Revolución de la Vivienda”. P. 187.
 Image # 9

Figure 9. Ciudadela Colsubsidios. Public Plaza. Samper, German. “La Revolución de la Vivienda”. P. 190.
 Image # 10

Figure 10. Ciudadela Colsubsidio. The kids can play safely. Samper, German.
“La Revolución de la Vivienda”. P. 192.
 Image # 11

Figure 11. Ciudadela Colsubsidios. Roundabouts. Taken by Vilegas Editores. Samper, German. “La Revolución de la Vivienda”. P. 181.
 Bibliography

O’Byrne, Cecilia Orozco; Isabel, Samper. “Casa + Casa + Casa = Ciudad? Germán Samper:
Una Investigación en Vivienda”. Bogotá: Universidad de los Andes, Facultad de
Arquitectura y Diseño, Departamento de Arquitectura; Ediciones Uniandes, 2012.
Samper, Germán . “La Arquitectura y la Ciudad: Apuntes de Viaje”. Bogotá, Colombia. Fondo
Editorial Escala, 1986.
Samper, Germán . “Recinto Urbano: La Humanización de la Ciudad”. Bogotá, Colombia.
Fondo Editorial Escala, 1997.
Samper, Germán . “La Revolución de la Vivienda” Bogotá, Colombia. Colección SomoSur.
2003.