May 2013, Volume 7, No. 5 (Serial No. 66), pp. 524-534 Journal of Civil Engineering and Architecture, ISSN 1934-7359, USA Artificial Stone in France (1830-1930): A Material between Modernity and Tradition Angelo Bertolazzi Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering, University of Padova, Padova 35131, Italy Abstract: 1920s and 1930s architecture has often been associated with the use of modern materials, such as reinforced concrete, glass and steel, mainly thanks to the role given them by the historiography of the modern, of presenting a break with former tradition and of spreading the need of architectural renewal. The study of architecture from the point of view of construction techniques evidences, instead, how architectural renewal started earlier, during the 19 century and involved the whole realm of building, even tradition-associated materials, such as wood and stone. Indeed, artificial stone (which appeared in early 19 century) represents—above all in France—a link between traditional construction in stone and the newborn reinforced-concrete technique, so as to underline the gradual shift from 19 century construction codes to the new industrial construction techniques, which in the 1920s and 1930s tend to overlap and blend, in this way determining a material continuity of modern and 19 century architecture. Key words: Artificial stone, industrial techniques, history construction, French architecture, 19 century, modern architecture. 1. Introduction The perception of a planning culture linked to the use of reinforced concrete and cement derives from the methodological setup of the early historiography of the modern movement, whose roots are to be found in the revolution caused by materials and by industrial techniques in late 19 and early 20 centuries and in the figurative revolution enacted by cubism [1]. The modernity of the first half of the 20 century has almost invariably been linked to the widespread use of the reinforced-concrete frame, which—according to Colin Rowe—has become the archetype of new architecture and its spatial matrix, representing what columns and vaults were in classical architecture [2]. Out of this, the essentially spatial interpretation of modern architecture was born, above all as regards architecture connected to avant-gardes and to the modern movement, though later on involving the whole history of architecture [3]. If, on the one hand, this viewpoint has doubtlessly been able to explain Corresponding author: Angelo Bertolazzi, Ph.D., research fields: modern architecture, construction history and building techniques in stone. E-mail: angelo.bertolazz@unipd.it. some stages in the formation of the modern movement and the relationships between figurative arts, architecture and industry, on the other hand, it has barred that bird’s eye view that would have allowed to assess the complexity of the constructive approaches characterizing western architecture between 1910 and 1930, where construction traditions underlie both eclectic and “rationalistic” construction, even if often hidden behind the mask of liberty style or the abstract image of the modern. It has often been forgotten that the technological revolution that developed during the 19 century had already tolled the end of classical constructive language, often transforming the grammatical tenets of classicism from trusty guidelines to grudgingly-borne trammels. The studies carried out in the last two decades by architectonic historiography have begun to reassess the manifold features of architecture in the first half of the 20 century, features that have often presented an alternative to the rationalistic model in the determination of the modern. At a more general level, this constructive approach allows an insight into the inner nature of the concrete form, whose character has since antiquity been defined by means of the materials DAVID PUBLISHING D