The Architecture and Cities of Northern Mexico from Independence to the Present

By Edward R. Burian

University of Texas Press

The states of Northern Mexico—Tamaulipas, Nuevo León, Coahuila, Chihuahua, Durango, Sonora, Sinaloa, and Baja California Norte and Sur—have architecture, urbanism, and landscape design that offer numerous lessons in how to build well, but this constructed environment is largely undervalued or unknown. To make this architecture better known to a wide professional, academic, and public audience, this book presents the first comprehensive overview in either English or Spanish of the architecture, urban landscapes, and cities of Northern Mexico from the country’s emergence as a modern nation in 1821 to the present day.

Profusely illustrated with color and black-and-white photographs, maps, and analytical drawings of urban cores of major cities, The Architecture and Cities of Northern Mexico systematically examines significant works of architecture in large cities and small towns in each state, from the earliest buildings in the urban core to the newest at the periphery. Edward R. Burian describes the most memorable works of architecture in each city in greater detail in terms of their spatial organization, materials, and sensory experience. He also includes a concise geographical and historical summary of the region that provides a useful background for the discussions of the works of architecture. Burian concludes the book with a brief commentary on lessons learned and possible futures for the architectural culture of the region, as well as the first comprehensive biographical listing of the architects practicing in Northern Mexico during the past two centuries.

...an important survey of the Mexican architecture of the region and a good resource to understand the various historical, stylistic, and formal developments that characterize its diverse architectural production during a vast historical period. Choice

The book makes a valuable, and even seminal, contribution to recent scholarship interested in shaping a more balanced history of Mexican architecture. Yale Constructs: The Yale School of Architecture Newspaper

An exceptional book. . . . Edward Burian has done an incredible job of documenting, researching, and systematizing a gigantic amount of information. . . . I have no doubt that the book will become the main reference on the architecture of northern Mexico and hopefully will inspire similar surveys of other parts of Mexico and Latin America, a region very much underrepresented in general architectural scholarship. Fernando Luiz Lara, Associate Professor of Architecture and Chair of the Brazil Center at the Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies, University of Texas at Austin; coauthor of Modern Architecture in Latin America: Art, Technology, and Utopia; and author of The Rise of Popular Modern

This book is crucial for redressing the enormous void in documenting the architecture of northern Mexico. . . . It breaks new ground by constructing the geographical field on which subsequent scholarly work will be carried out. . . . The author’s conscientious and determined cataloguing of significant sites dating from the nineteenth to the twenty-first centuries is extraordinary. Stephen Fox, Fellow of the Anchorage Foundation of Texas

An architect and widely published scholar on the architecture, urbanism, and material culture of Mexico, Edward R. Burian is Associate Professor in the Department of Architecture at the University of Texas at San Antonio. He edited and wrote Modernity and the Architecture of Mexico, which was published in Spanish as Modernidad y arquitectura en México.

List of Abbreviations

Acknowledgments

Introduction

The Geography and Landscapes of Northern Mexico

A Historical Overview of Northern Mexico: Evolving Urban, Architectural, and Landscape Types

Tamaulipas

Nuevo León

Coahuila

Chihuahua

Durango

Sonora

Sinaloa