Luis Gutiérrez Soto was a Spanish architect. He graduated from the Madrid School of Architecture in 1923 and worked primarily in Madrid, where he completed around 400 projects. He is considered one of the main representatives of Rationalism in Spain, evolving into other styles in the 1950s and 1960s.
He was part of the so-called “Generation of ‘25,” within the Modern Movement. In 1958, he was elected a member of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando. In his youth, he played for Real Madrid’s first team, where he was nicknamed “Pichichi,” like the Athletic Club forward. A year after graduating, he worked in Modesto López Otero’s studio and later opened his own. His frequent travels abroad allowed him to discover the early works of Le Corbusier and other avant-garde architects who had a significant influence on him, such as Otto Wagner, Josef Hoffmann, Bruno Taut, and Hans Poelzig.
He practiced a unique style, not aligning with any specific avant-garde movement, while experimenting with technical innovations and the use of new materials. His work evolved from the foundations of traditional architecture toward the new functionalist, rationalist, and expressionist principles characteristic of modern architecture and of GATEPAC (Group of Spanish Architects and Technicians for the Progress of Contemporary Architecture), a group he closely followed but never formally joined.
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Buildings
Madrid, Spain
Cinema Barceló