In 1961 Antonio Valtl decided to look for a site that would enable him to enlarge the facilities of his company, the Herder publishing house, for which he bought the chamfered corner building of Carrer Roger de Flor and Carrer Provença, which then housed the Orfenat de Sant Josep (Sant Josep Orphanage), owned by the congregation of the Sisters of the Holy Family of Bordeaux and the community of Devout Nuns of Santa Caterina de Siena. It was a property of very rigid layout, based on big longitudinal walls that followed the direction of the chamfered corner and which resulted in large halls designed to house dormitories for the residents or service rooms.

Valtl’s idea was to demolish this building and build a new one that he entrusted to Josep Ribas González, who on visiting the property to study its demolition, proposed respecting the walls and reconverting the spaces. His project provided big changes in the layout of the already existing building: he placed work areas on the open floors, opened holes in the old façade, which gave it slenderness with vertical outlines, and just on the corner of the interior façade, placed a glazed tile spiral staircase and some lifts. In 1973 the excellent functioning of the building, which originally had 4 floors (a ground floor and three upper floors), encouraged the owner to entrust Ribas with the erection of 4 new floors, an enlargement that was undertaken following the same lines of the initial project and which gave the building its current rotundity.

• Date: 1964
• Area: n/a m²
• Stage: Built
• Location: Barcelona, Spain