The Painter's Studio is developed on the ground floor and two floors, the concrete slabs are light and visible, the marquetry is made of structural steel, the roof is sawtooth; its finishes demonstrate great austerity and economy. Great attention was paid to the natural lighting required for such a studio, solved with floor-to-ceiling windows. The use of the open plan can also be appreciated, at the level of the accesses supported by light piles. The introduction of these elements in the architecture of that time, constitutes one of the most valuable contributions to modern architecture of the  twentieth century .

The building was created as a museum by presidential decree on April 1, 1981, published in the Official Gazette of the Federation on the 24th of the same month, incorporating the aforementioned property, construction and objects existing in it into the public domain and its custody was assigned to the National Institute of Fine Arts (INBA). On December 16, 1986, the museum opened its doors to the public as the Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo House-Studio Museum-INBA, as part of the celebrations for the centenary of Diego Rivera 's birth . Its cultural vocation was then defined in the tasks of preservation, conservation, research and exhibition of the life and work of Kahlo, Rivera and O'Gorman, as well as contemporary art.

The INBA, aware of the heritage and artistic value of the twin houses, restored Kahlo's studio house between July and December 1995, through its Architecture Department, and Rivera's studio house during the same period of the following year, in order to recover their original appearance. The museum was reopened by President Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de León on February 28, 1997, and the buildings were declared National Artistic Heritage on March 25 of the following year.

The collection of the Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo House-Studio Museum consists of the twin houses, today the most important existing example of functionalist architecture that, developed by Le Corbusier , was assimilated and applied by O'Gorman in Mexico. From 1934 Rivera occupied the Studio, where he painted most of his easel work, his watercolors , sketches for murals and some transportable murals and where he died on November 24, 1957 at 11:20 p.m. The house was inherited by his daughter, Ruth Rivera Marín , who donated it to the INBA.

Architect: Juan O'Gorman

His work was a turning point in modern architecture. The houses built by  Juan O'Gorman  for  Diego  and  Frida Kahlo  are an example of his  functionalist architecture , in which the architect plays in an innovative way with double heights, volumes and materials that leave a particular mark on the way of inhabiting the space; "The minimum of expense and effort for the maximum of utility." is the premise that synthesizes his already classic work within the history of architecture. This new proposal highlights the simplicity of the forms and grants great purity to the construction.

The three studio houses

At the age of 24, and with his first income as a draftsman, Juan O'Gorman bought two terraced tennis courts and on one of them he would explore the possibilities of new architecture between 1929 and 1931. He first experimented with building a studio-house on the lowest ground. Although he said it was intended for his father Cecil Crawford O'Gorman , there are reasons to believe that he actually wanted to show it to Diego Rivera , the husband of his childhood friend Frida Kahlo . When he finished it in 1931, he invited Diego, who was very impressed. The young architect offered him the neighbouring field at cost if the painter would commission him to design and build his studio. The master accepted, and the result was two studio-houses, one for him and one for Frida.

O'Gorman was familiar with the architectural proposals of the European avant-garde, in particular those of the famous architect Le Corbusier . With these three buildings he provided innovative solutions in the field of structures, as well as the use of glass and steel, concrete stairs and the visibility of the facilities as an expressive element within the language of modernity. From popular Mexican culture he incorporated the use of exposed clay on some roofs and the colouring of the walls and cactus fences, which resulted in a highly original nationalist cosmopolitanism.

Upon being commissioned by Diego Rivera , Juan O'Gorman immediately undertook the project in the first half of 1931. A year later he finished the two studio houses, while Diego and Frida were in Detroit. The houses were immediately photographed by Guillermo Kahlo , Frida's father. It was not until 1934 that the couple moved to this place. At Diego's request, the project proposes two multi-storey houses. A small workshop and photographic archive are also included. The ground floor of the complex is left almost entirely free, following Le Corbusier 's idea , and functions as a hall and living area in both houses, the upper part of which is suspended on pilotis , already present in the 1929 house. Here too, the land is bordered by cactus fences.

Diego's studio house is influenced by a famous work by Le Corbusier from 1922, the studio house of the painter Amédée Ozenfant in Paris , with a sawtooth roof and a spiral exterior staircase with a concrete handrail. These elements are present in Diego's studio, which is however larger and more complex, as demonstrated by the double-height area on which an extension of the studio is located. Frida's house does not follow specific models and the external staircase leading to the roof represents a notable innovation, with cantilevered concrete steps and a tubular handrail reduced to a minimum. All the staircases in both buildings have a special architectural significance . The water tanks, the pipes for the rainwater drainage and the water supply are also visible here, but the thick pipes for the garbage ducts, which go down to small metal tubes, are a novelty. The electrical installations appear visible again, as well as the tubular handrails, which are even more abundant.

Diego Rivera's studio house

Ground floor and first floor

The ground floor of this house is almost entirely open space, except for the small service area. The external staircase is a much larger and more elaborate variant of the one in Juan O'Gorman 's house from 1929, with high concrete handrails, and its construction in two sections must have been very complex. The quality of its execution is remarkable, with precise control of the geometry and its finish. It is without a doubt the dominant element of the façade, facing Palmas Street, and also of the north façade, which is completely glazed.

The first flight of stairs leads to the small interior hall on the first floor, behind a door, like all the others, with a steel frame and fiber cement panel. From this internal space a straight staircase with horizontal concrete slabs starts. To the left there is access to a small room used as a gallery of the works that Diego had for sale. The floor in all the interiors is again made of pine planks stained with the “congo” pigment. The doors and windows retain the original bronze handles. On the rest of the floor there is a bedroom and a bathroom closed to the public. All the slabs have concrete ribs and pressed clay blocks, as in the 1929 toilets. On this floor there may have been a kitchenette for heating already prepared food, near one of the mouths of the garbage chute.

Second floor

The second floor is reached by both the last flight of the exterior staircase and the interior staircase, and once again we find a hall, which in this case leads to the left, to the most important space of all: the painter's studio. It is striking for its large dimensions, whose double height is further increased by the sawtooth of the roof, also with ribs and blocks of clay. The large window to the north is located on an oblique extension of the studio; a turn that allowed O'Gorman to find the magnetic north, to minimize the entry of the Sun. The lower part of this window can be completely opened to raise canvases with large frames.

The visible electric cables with the hanging spotlights are very noticeable. The sawtooths, which run north and follow the direction of the street to a lesser extent, led the architect to place fibre cement sunshades on the outside to shade each window. Some of these, at a great height, open by mechanical mechanisms within reach of a person. It is worth noting that in the solution for the sunshades, O'Gorman was more than five years ahead of Le Corbusier himself, who would make them a characteristic feature of his architecture.

The studio space extends to a lower height, on one side, to accommodate a living room and a preparation room for painting materials, on the other side, to store on shelves part of a collection of popular art. This annex produces the double height of the ground floor. The studio furniture (armchairs with cushions, equipales, wooden chairs of popular origin), the denim curtains (on all the windows of the house) and the green painted wooden chest of drawers are original, as are the enormous cardboard “Judases” that hang and rest in various parts.

On the second floor there is a bedroom occupied by the painter and a bathroom open to the public, the only one with a shower, in which the furniture and accessories are all original, including a sink for washing brushes and utensils. From the hall begins another section of the internal staircase, leading to the third floor.

Mezzanine and rooftops

The top level of the house has a mezzanine open to the studio, which allows you to better appreciate its space, the large window and the indented roof. There is a built-in cabinet or planer for storing drawings and an armchair from the original furniture. The next room was Diego's office, with the desk and other period items. The outside door of this space leads to a small roof terrace (the roof of the studio annex) that allows you to see the entire complex, including the 1929 house and its grounds.

The studio wall continues upwards until it ends with the sawtooth tiles, which drain into a concrete channel connected to the metal pipe that goes down to the ground. Here we see a small metal staircase to go up to the roof, similar to the one in the 1929 house. The handrails made of tubes painted in anti-rust red dominate the rest of this space, which extends towards the bridge and the perimeter of the roof of Frida's house. We can also see the water tanks in Diego's house and the radio antenna on thin tubes, larger than in the 1929 house. There is also an interesting view of the exterior staircase of Frida's house, whose upper landing merges with the concrete rainwater collector.

The rooftop of Frida's house is another important viewing point, with the red water tank as the only element present there. Despite its difficult access, there are photographs of Frida posing on this rooftop and on the one in the annex of Diego's studio. From here you can see the San Ángel Inn neighborhood, where neocolonial buildings predominate , all of which are later than the studio houses of Juan O'Gorman , since originally it was a place with orchards and few country residences.

Frida Kahlo's studio house

Ground floor and first floor

As in Diego's house, the ground floor of Frida's house is a mostly open space, supported by stilts. Only a semicircular staircase and the toilets interrupt the open plan. From the street, the beginning of the staircase can be seen, which turns and ends in a straight line in front of the access door on the first floor. In this one, on the left, there is a small kitchen that may have originally had a coal stove, later adapted to gas. In the rest are the dining room and the living room, illuminated to the east and south respectively: from the latter one can clearly see the flight of stairs that ascends to the second floor, as well as some vitro blocks that illuminate the space of the lower flight. The doors and windows, with their accessories, as well as the electrical installation, are still the same as in Diego's house and are similar to those of the house from 1929.

Second floor

The top floor, on the eastern side, is used as the painter's studio, which bears a strong resemblance to the studio in the 1929 house, as its three exterior sides are entirely glazed and the windows fold like screens. The one facing north opens partially to access the landing of the staircase that goes up to the roof. There are photographs of Frida working in this studio, posing next to a piece of furniture, and in another, she appears sitting next to Diego with the wood heater behind them, located near the bathroom door. Both the heater and the bathroom itself are very similar to those in the 1929 house, with the piece of artificial granite that offers a hollow to rest one's head. The sink and its accessories are original, but the faucets for the tub and shower are not. Finally, the small bedroom, which barely allows for a single bed, is located next to the stairs, with the window facing south. 

Juan O'Gorman's House from 1929

Incorporating various innovations that represented a true architectural challenge, the first modern house in Mexico was designed and built by Juan O'Gorman between 1929 and 1931. An example of this is the glass studio on the upper floor, with three floor-to-ceiling windows and corner to corner, with a perimeter concrete frame that completely surrounds them, horizontally and vertically. The shade garden, named after the architect, is bordered by three slender columns that recall Le Corbusier 's pilotis ; from this space begins the helical staircase that required rigorous control of its geometry and construction process. The terraces defined by round river stone and maguey grass are the solution to the difference in level between what were two tennis courts and the street. Over time they disappeared, but during the restoration process of the building in 2012-2013 they were reconstructed from vestiges and photographs.

The cactus fences surrounding the site give total transparency to its boundaries, allowing this house to be visually integrated with Diego and Frida's neighboring buildings. The north facade is almost blind, with two tall, horizontal windows on each floor, which correspond to the kitchen and bathrooms. In the centre, the pipe that collects rainwater from the roof runs down, collected by a concrete channel, over which the water tanks are located. Like all the metal elements, these have the anti-corrosion red paint that was common at the time. The restoration included the reconstruction of the complex aerial spiral staircase, the placement of new foundations and the metal reinforcement of all vertical supports, in addition to the replacement of certain mud walls with concrete to comply with current earthquake regulations.

The ground floor

Access to the house is via a hall, named after O'Gorman , and is limited by a curved wall that connects with the service and kitchen. On the other side are the living room and dining room, where life was spent together, with family or friends. The internal staircase leads to the private part of the house. It is made of concrete with a red-tinted artificial granite finish and linoleum on the treads and landing. Under it there is a metal stove as a heater. The metal flue visibly crosses the space to heat the entire property. Most of the flattened walls are made of hollow pressed clay blocks, seeking lightness and thermal insulation. The paint reproduces the original colors. The electrical wiring is completely visible, and the windows and doors have metal profiles.

The Study

The study is undoubtedly the most important of all the spaces in the house. It is a notable innovation in the context of modern architecture worldwide. Although factories had already used glass facades entirely, this was not yet the case in domestic architecture. In this house, three of the faces that enclose a space were used. The glass surfaces are projected towards the exterior through the frame that surrounds them, leaving the three columns of the upper floor free, thus accentuating the idea of ​​a box made only of glass, from corner to corner. The longest of the faces, facing west, has folding leaves like screens, which allow the study to be opened up to fully integrate the exterior space with the interior. In the only wall there is a niche and the final section of the fireplace appears, to partially heat this room. As in the rest of the house, the electrical installations are visible, the slab has the trace of the visible formwork and the wooden floor is tinted with the color of the “congo” pigment.

The staircase, the circulations and the bathroom

The interior staircase and the circulation areas have as handrails a solution that O'Gorman adopted in many of his works of this period: hydraulic pipes joined with plumbing parts, such as elbows and "T" fittings, always painted with anti-rust red. The longer hallway leads to the three bedrooms: two of them very small and the master bedroom with its own bathroom, currently operational areas of the museum. The shorter hallway has a niche to house a wood or fuel heater, as it was called, placed where its function makes it most efficient, near the two bathrooms.

The open bathroom retains all its original elements: furniture, keys, taps, towel racks and toilet paper accessories. The solution with pulleys to open the vents deserves attention, as their height prevents them from being moved by hand. On the side where the head would be placed when using the tub, O'Gorman left a gap that is repeated in Frida Kahlo 's house . The bathroom floor is made of artificial granite, unlike the rest of the house, which is made of pine planks with the yellow color of the period, called "congo." The doors are made of metal profiles and fiber cement panels.