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History

Origins enclosure Motherhood

The history of the Home of Motherhood starts around the middle of of the 19th century, at Barcelona. Regulated by the general Law of beneficència, of June 20, 1849 and the Regulation on the Law of beneficència, of May 14, 1852, was created by the Real decree, of July 6, 1853, with the name of Provincial Home of Motherhood and Expòsits of Barcelona, at the venues ceded by the Home of Mercy, that depended of the municipal administration, at the street of the Ramelleres, at the neighbourhood of the Suburb. Since the onsets the Home of Motherhood depended of Barcelona's Deputation.

 

The first transfer of asilats at the new Home of Motherhood was the November 23, 1853 and corresponded at new dides and thirty-two girls that proceeded of the Hospital of the Saint Cross, founded at beginnings of the 15th century, as a result of the fusion of the distinct hospitals of Barcelona's city. At the Home, there were two bands: the creatures confined at the section of Lactància and those that had among two and five years, that found at the section of Desmamats.

 

 

At the onsets, roughly the 50% of the creatures that took at the Home of Motherhood made it through a turn installed at the mur exterior of the edifice and that consisted at a wooden till giratòria. The turn was valid among the years 1854 and 1931 and still today conserves at the façade of the plaza Bonsuccés. The second road of income were the expòsits that proceeded of the peoples and the cities of the rest of the province of Barcelona. One third road of entry at the Home were the creatures that had been abandoned at Barcelona's streets or at the parishes of the city. At last term, found the legitimate children handed, that only represented one 5% of the asilats.

 

From mitjan of the 19th century arose in the United Kingdom a new social current nicknamed higienisme, preoccupied by the spread of the epidemics, the conditions insalubres at the industrial cities and the headway of the medicine. The discovery of the bacteria for the microbiologist Louis Pasteur, the creation of university chairs on higienisme or the diffusion of this current through manuals and varied publications, represented a change of scientific paradigm that made the most sensitive society in front of the sanitary worries. In Barcelona, some representatives of the higienisme were the doctor Pere Felip Monlau, who claimed the overthrow of the walls of the city at the project of 1841 nicknamed Abajo las murallas!!!, Lluís Comenge and Ferrer, president of the Academy of Hygiene of Catalonia, created the 1887 and of the Institute of Hygiene Urbana of Barcelona of 1891, and Francesc Castells Ballespí, founder of the Magazine of Hygiene and Sanitary Politician the 1890.

The theories higienistes bet to reduce the density of the populace in the houses at the cities industrialised, to reduce the mortality and the impact of epidemics. Barcelona, at concrete, had a growth of notable populace during the second half of the 19th century, passing of the 189.948 inhabitants the 1860, at the 405.913 the 1887 and at the 544.137 inhabitants, the 1900.

I collapse of the ancient edifice and transfer at can Caballé

Preoccupied by the sanitary question, the new Home of Motherhood wanted to give start at problems how now the amuntegament of the interns at the installations at the neighbourhood of the Suburb, or the lack of dides to give lactància sufficient at the creatures. The childbirths, on their part, continued attending at a booth of the Hospital of the Saint Cross.

The supply was a fundamental task that sustentaven the dides, that could internal or external. The dides internal resided at the same Home, whereas the external took care at the creatures at the domicile where resided and the suckled until the five years, moment at what returned at the institution. The lack of dides was chronic along the history of the Home of Motherhood and the economic expense that comported always represented a very excelled game of the estimate.

Among 1853 and 1884 the sanitary personnel of the home was formed by two doctors, a practitioner, a midwife, the sisters of the Charity of Sant Vicent of Paül, a priest and a concierge.

 

The diffusion of the currents higienistes, together with the progressive medical advances, as well as the progressive increase of the interns at the Home of Motherhood and the structural limitations of his installations (that stressed from the second half of the decade of the seventy), took at Barcelona's Deputation at seeking new sites for the transfer of the Home of Motherhood at the outskirts of the city, how for example at the Villa de Gràcia and Sarrià. The institution lacked of water in plenty and did not count, for example, with a destined infirmary at the sicknesses infeccioses.

The shoot of rage of 1854, caused by a pertinent ship of Marseille, forced the preventive transfer of the girls at the homestead Pomaret, sited at Sarrià, thanks to the cession of the terrains for part of the Hospital of the Saint Cross. Three years next projected a new establishment at the farm nicknamed Merry of Bass, but the operation does not go reeixir and the Home of Motherhood decided to acquire some neighboring venues at the street of the Ramelleres, the 1863.

 

It was not until the session of December 27, 1877, that Barcelona's Deputation agreed the acquisition of the farm homestead Caballé, at the Villa of the Corts of Sarrià, for edificar the new installations, that made effective the August of the following year.

 

The homestead Caballé was the ideal option so that, band to present prices lower and have nice communications with Barcelona, was sited at some rural surroundings out of the city that provided alone, pure air and had supply of water. An element at excelling was the fact that the edifices and installations constructed ex profess and this permitted to design the architectural room tracking the councils higienistes of the medical experts.

The worry for the higienisme

The year 1882 the doctors of the Home of Motherhood Joan Rull and Xuriach (pioneer of the obstetrics and the gynaecology of the second half of the 19th century), Josep Cabot and Rovira (specialised at the survey of the childish mortality and director of the medical body of the Home, among 1907 and 1915) and Rafael Rodríguez Méndez (catedràtic of Hygiene of the University of Barcelona) got the assignment to draft a dictamen on the hygienic sizes that had to reunite the future Provincial Home of Motherhood and Expòsits at the homestead Caballé. This dictamen published the 1883 and had a big importance, attended that it was the model for the posterior architectural projects that developed the Home of Motherhood during the following decades. The criterion that tracked was more functional that economic, and along this line constructed progressively several edifices or isolated booths, since this factor improved the conditions of salubritat.

The dictamen facultatiu projected a distribution of edifices that took into account the natural and mixed vent and with wide finestrals. Concurrently, it recommended the natural and mixed heating by means of chimneys of open fire that would have to install all over of the bedrooms, canteens, schools and other dependencies.

The doctors Rull and Cabot foresaw two sections in the enclosure: at the north projected a pool of edifices for the section of motherhood, and at the south the edifices of the section of borderia or of expòsits. The section of motherhood would have of three edifices that would be communicated by the flat of bass with a gallery. A first edifice would be for rooms of parts, that would include a secret motherhood for those interns that would give at light at his own dwelling; another for girls expòsites of 7 at 18 years, and a third edifice of infirmary for the Sisters of the Charity and other personnel of the establishment. On their part, the section of expòsits would two edifices: one for expòsits of lactància until the three months with the dides corresponding, and another for the girls desmamats of the two sexes, of the three at the seven years. Each edifice of the enclosure did not have to have more of 250 inhabitants and all the pool of the motherhood would around 400 stagnate.

The worry for the hygiene was present along all the dictamen: it projected a booth isolated for sicknesses epidèmiques and contagious, a department of hydrotherapy and a room of operations that it would be necessary to install at the booth for infirmary, as well as a small booth for deposit of corpses and room of autopsies. Also it posed the building of a swimming pool, a school of swimming and a gymnasium. Finally, it established the necessity that the new room had a discharge of potable water, although it had the shafts of the farm of the homestead Caballé.

Regardless this architectural design thought according to parameters higienistes, the lack of economic estimate and the concentration of the asilats at the ancient installations of the street of the Ramelleres made that the first steps of the new Home of Motherhood were at nice part improvised. Every folded derived at a adequació provisional of the homestead Caballé at function of the circumstances, and the building of two new wings adjoining at the farm.

The social context that lived Barcelona during these years, obviously also impacted at the institution. The July 1, 1884 made finally the first transfer of boys of the section of desmamats to the new dependencies and a year next the of the girls. Also it is necessary to signal that the new epidemic of rage that lived the Catalan capital the summer of 1885 speeded the building of the new Home of Motherhood.

Roman Prats and Montells and Ignasi Conrad Bartrolí were the two first architects that designed the enclosure of the Home of Motherhood, tracking the dictamen medical avantdit. Prats presented his project the February 12, 1883, at what projected at the north part nine edifices destined at motherhood and twelve at the south half, that would correspond at borderia and that would stay parted by a plaza at the centre.

 

Conrad Bartrolí, on their part, announced his architectural project the October 20, 1884. According to this design, the borderia would localise also at the south part of the enclosure and would feature of nine booths, whereas the motherhood, at the north, would have of eight edifices. But or Prats's project or the of Conrad took finally at term, at nice part for every one tracked of budgetary lacks, but also for the convuls social and political context that lived Barcelona during the nicknamed Sexenni Democratic (1868-1874).

 

 

The 1885 died Prats and, two years later, the modernist architect Camil Oliveras obtained the plaza of provincial architect. As a consequence, the 1888 Barcelona's Deputation commissioned at Oliveras the project of building of a section of borderia and, later, of the Home of Motherhood at distinct booths. The works inducted the June 30, 1890 and derived the building of the following booths:

• Lactància, commenced the 1890 and ended the 1892, and that permitted the transfer of the creatures suckled and the dides, that until then found at the street of the Ramelleres. The scientific advances, at special at the field of the pediatrics, and the introduction of special milks and maternitzades well entered the 20th century, permitted a progressive descent of the childish mortality of the interns of the Home. A permanent problem was the insufficient number of dides internal, owed at the low wages that got and the poor material conditions that got at the enclosure.
  
  

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  Dress partial of the hall of the booth of Lactància projected by the architect Camil Oliveras, c.1910. Unfamiliar authorship. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB R. 21730)

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  Porta of entered booth of Lactància, c.1903. Unfamiliar authorship. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB R. 21724)

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• Sicknesses infeccioses. The two booths projected were situated at the north of the section of borderia. The building of these booths differed of the consigned at the dictamen of 1883, according to which had to be wooden, and thought more adapted construct them of work. The building of the first booth dates of the 1893 and, at fault of a general infirmary with all the features, the doctors utilised one of the two booths as a room of operations.
• Bugaderia, laundry rooms and stoves of disinfection, ended the 1895. This booth was situated east of the enclosure, among the booth of Lactància and the booth of sicknesses infeccioses.
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  Principal façade of the edifice of laundry room, 23/11/1889. Authorship: Camil Oliveras, signed by Josep Bori. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB 2299, exp. 3)

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  Low plant of the edifice of laundry room, 17/10/1892. Authorship: Camil Oliveras. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB 2300, exp. 3)

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  Laundry rooms and bugaderia, c.1930. Unfamiliar authorship. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB R. 21726)

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  Laundry room of the Home of Motherhood, c.1920. Unfamiliar authorship. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB 2018)

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• Desmamats, met as a Ave Maria, was destined at the creatures of 2 at 5 years. It was situated at the west, in parallel at the booth of Lactància and was ended the 1896. At the first flat there were the bedrooms (with a capacity of 30 beds cadascun), four for the creatures of masculine sex, and two for the of feminine sex. Also there were the basins, the cameras roberes, the toilets and the cameras of surveillance.
  
   

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  Booth of Desmamats, c.1920. Unfamiliar authorship. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB 3662).

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• The booths of infirmary and the llatzeret were projected by Oliveras, but did not construct . With motif of the epidemic of rage of 1885 the constructor Epifani Robert had constructed a provisional infirmary where there was the ancient orchard of the farm. It expects to construct the planned general infirmary for the project of the dictamen facultatiu published the 1883, one of the booths of sicknesses infeccioses was destined at infirmary for creatures of both sexes.
• At the case of the church projected , but did not construct in its entirety. As a alternative, Josep Goday goes edificar a chapel among 1914 and 1915, situated at the booth of the Desmamats, that was the only religious room of the enclosure. At chapel also took part the artist and fellow Francesc Canyellas, with a pool of paintings murals, that in the course of time disappeared.
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  Capella of the Booth of Desmamats, c.1920-1930. Unfamiliar authorship. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB R. b007580_302_50250)

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The 1894 commissioned at Oliveras the preliminary draft for the opening of a road of communication among the Home of Motherhood and Barcelona in order that it facilitated the kicks and communications of the asylum. Josep Bori, cousin of Oliveras, seized the relief as a provincial architect and commissioned of the building of the following booths:

• Cuisines, 1901.
  
  

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  Principal façade central booth of the enclosure of Motherhood, 15/10/1898. Authorship: Josep Bori. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB R.2566)

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  Cuisines, c.1920. Unfamiliar authorship. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB R. 23768)

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  Booth of cuisines, c.1910-1920. Unfamiliar authorship. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB R. 2447)

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• Deposit of corpses and room of autopsies, ended the 1906.
• Prat of the Bank, destined at minor creatures of seven years, and Sisters, for the Sisters's religious personnel of the Charity. The building of these two booths, a pool structured at two big edifices in shape of U with uneven arms, dilated , attended that it inducted the 1908 and finalised the 1928.
   
  
  

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  Layout of the first flat of the edifices Prat of the Bank, 1932. Unfamiliar authorship. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB R.6672)

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  Layout of the first flat of the edifices Prat of the Bank, 1932. Unfamiliar authorship. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB R.6674)

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  Indoor yard of the Booth Prat of the Bank, c.1915. Authorship: Photo Studio Mas. Fund: Barcelona's Deputation. (CAT AGDB 14916b)

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The Regulation of the Home of Motherhood and Expòsits of the year 1894 decreed obligatory vaccinations for all the expòsits and also for those that were at external breeding. The new text also established that at ends of each month the doctors had to make an account of all the sicknesses and demises occurred with all the observations that considered timely, for such to be able to improve the general situation of the Home.

 

The 1904 published the monograph of the General architect Guitart and Lostaló based at the visit guided that it realised the February 7, 1904 for the members of the Association of Architects of Catalonia, among them the also architect and political Josep Puig and Cadafalch, later president of the Mancomunitat of Catalonia (1917-1923). Guitart had got the assignment of this association to make an architectural appraisal of the buildings precedents that had realised at the Home of Motherhood, but also of face at the design of the future, coinciding with the weddings of gold of the institution that had celebrated the November 23, 1903.