"However, the main problem with the project was one of scale. The building had to cover an unobstructed interior area of approximately 27,000 square meters. This span forced Candela to go beyond his comfort zone of the thin concrete shells that had made his reputation and into a new structural typology. His solution was a geodesic dome."
Mexico City hosted the 1968 Olympics as the first Games awarded to a Latin American country and the first for a Spanish-speaking host. The government formed an organizing committee to project Mexico and its culture internationally, appointing architect Pedro Ramírez Vázquez as president. His approach combined international modernist techniques with Pre-Columbian references and local material culture. The committee oversaw construction and adaptation of venues across southern Mexico City, using mostly local architects, engineers, and technicians. The Palacio de los Deportes, for basketball, required the most complex structural work, covering about 27,000 square meters unobstructed. A design competition through the Secretaría de Obras Públicas selected Félix Candela, with collaborators Antonio Peyrī Macià and Enrique Castañeda Tamborell. Candela’s background in thin-shell hyperbolic paraboloid concrete forms led him to adopt a geodesic dome to meet the scale challenge.
#1968-olympics #mexican-architecture #modernism-and-pre-columbian-references #felix-candela #geodesic-dome
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