Edificio Prourban, High-rise building in Retiro district, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Torre Prourban is a cylindrical office tower at the northern end of Avenida 9 de Julio, beside Avenida del Libertador in Retiro, Buenos Aires. Its opaque concrete facade is moulded with horizontal and vertical grooves and set with square glass panes two metres wide that project from the wall. The granite-clad entrance portico leads to a ten-metre-high hall with San Luis stone floors, radial bands of white marble and travertine walls.
Creaurban, Franco Macri's development company, bought the corner lot on Avenida del Libertador at Carlos Pellegrini in the late 1970s and commissioned the design in 1978 from the studio of Flora Manteola, Javier Sánchez Gómez, Josefa Santos, Justo Solsona and Rafael Viñoly, with Carlos Salaberry as associate architect. Construction ran from 1979 to 1983 under Eugenio Grassetto S.A. and SIDECO Americana S.A., crowning the northern end of the finished Avenida 9 de Julio beside Edificio Chacofi II.
The building earned the nickname 'El Rulero' from its cylindrical shape, which resembles a hair roller used in styling. This playful name shows how locals have embraced the distinctive form as part of the neighborhood's character.
The tower occupies a corner lot with 70 metres of frontage on each street, at the northern tip of Avenida 9 de Julio where it meets Avenida del Libertador. The ground slopes down with the avenue toward the later Autopista Arturo U. Illia bridge, so the base is best seen from the Carlos Pellegrini side. The entrance portico is clad in granite.
In 1986 Sevel, Franco Macri's car company, mounted Argentina's tallest and largest advertising structure at the tower's top: an iron and sheet-metal frame lit with neon showing the Fiat and Peugeot logos. Later signs advertised Chrysler, CTI Móvil, Claro and Tarjeta Naranja; a modern LED sign now crowns the building.
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