The Urban Scale of Science and the Enlargement of Madrid (1851-1936)

Abstract

During the Enlightenment, Madrid’s scientific institutions, such as the Botanical Garden or the Natural History Museum, served the demands of court ornamentation as well as colonial efficiency. They were landmarks of new urbanism and new science. In the 19th century engineers and hygienists shifted their focus from empire to city. The relevance of their know-how was now certified by their capacity to solve the city’s problems. They had to bring water, design urban expansion and fight epidemics. Once again the sites from which these new actors reformed the city were heterotopias, symbols of the promised metropolis: new monuments both by their architecture and their noble function as scientific institutions. All these local concerns were to be set aside by a new scientific community emerging in Madrid in the first decade of the 20th century. A group of physicists, chemists and biologists in search of international recognition formed a new scientific campus on the outskirts of the city. The rationalism of their buildings was the best symbol of the new scientific culture of precision. The change of architecture also meant a change of culture. Our aim is to recover a lost sense of the city by placing ourselves at the beginning of the process of urban production. We hope that such a focus will reveal the fundamental role of scientific activity in the definition of urban spaces.