Félix Candela
Félix Candela
- Félix Candela was a Spanish architect and structural engineer.
- Was porn in January, 1910,
- Studied architecture at La Escuela Superior de Arquitectura (Madrid Superior Technical School of Architecture.
- Luis Vegas,his material strength professor, gave him the honorary title of "Luis Vegas" Helper".
- In school, Candela didn't show intellectual or aesthetic efforts .
- Graduated from La Escuela Superior de Arquitectura in 1935.
- IIn 1936 Spanish civil war began.
- Candela returned to Spain to fight.
- He sided with the republic and fought against Franco.
- Therefore he could not stay in the new Spain as long as Franco was the head of state.
- Candela was put onto a ship bound for Mexico, where he would start his career.
- Worked from the 1930s to the 1960s.
- In Mexico and until 1949, Candela worked as an architect.
- Played a significant role in the development of Mexican architecture.
- In 1949, he started to engineer many concrete structures utilizing his well known thin-shell design.
- His major contribution to structural engineering was the development of thin shells made out of reinforced concrete.
- He believed that strength should come from form not mass.
- Félix Candela extensively studied tensile shell structures.
- In Mexico, he married Eladia Marti
- Candela did most of his work in Mexico throughout the 1950s and into the late 60s.
- He was responsible for more than 300 works and 900 projects in this time period.
- Many of his larger projects were given to him by the Mexican government, such as the Cosmic Rays Pavilion.
- Félix Candela died at the age of 87 years old in 1997 in North Carolina.
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