Click Goes the Camera and On Goes Life
Back in 1892 in the genesis of town planning as a profession, the British theorist Ebenezer Howard published his highly influential tome Tomorrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform. Six years later, it was reissued with the catchier title Garden Cities of Tomorrow. His idealised garden city would house 32,000 people on 3,600 hectares based on a concentric pattern incorporating open spaces and public parks. A couple of decades after Ebenezer’s bestseller had hit the shelves, Letchworth and Welwyn, both on the outskirts of London, would become Britain’s first and last garden cities.
The idea took root across Europe. Bilbao is blessed with surrounding mountain ranges from Artxanda to the northeast to Pagasarri to the south. A beautiful sense of containment is the result. On the lower slopes of Artxanda opposite the Guggenheim Museum, above the far bank of the River Nervión, is the Basque interpretation of a garden city. Mainly white villas with black timbered details, clearly channelling a vernacular of old, are set in the generous verdant plots of Matio Ciudad Jardín.
Commercial and community buildings overlook Celso Negeuruela Plaza in the heart of Matio Ciudad Jardín. It’s all so low rise and low density compared to the mansion blocks of the tight urban grid that is central Bilbao. A hillside funicular and glass lifts descending from the Maurice Ravel Etorb dual carriageway connect Matio Ciudad Jardín to the city centre.
In 1922 Basque architect Pedro Ispizua won a municipal competition to design a residential led mixed use scheme for the stated funded Cooperative of Employees and Journalists. His 56 pairs of semi detached houses line roads striping and curling up the gradient. Regionalist architecture blends Basque farmhouse style with modern living requirements. Red pantile roofs contrast with the monochromatic elevations.
Later insertions include a pale grey rendered house with a corner circular conical roofed tower opening onto a large terrace made for parties and propped up by impossibly high retaining walls. Matio Ciudad Jardín, like other garden cities of Europe, is now a sought after address. The semi rural ambiance, the retro architecture and panorama across Bilbao to Pagasarri are an estate agent’s dream.
