The director of UIC Barcelona School of Architecture, Josep Lluís i Ginovart, and lecturer Mónica López Piquer were conference speakers at the “International Scientific Committee on Fortifications and Military Heritage” (ICOFORT) organised by the Friends of Montjuïc Castle Association and the Spanish Ministry of Defence. The international conference took place between 14 and 17 November and was held in the iconic fortress of Castell de Sant Ferran near Figueres. 

Josep Lluís i Ginovart and Mónica López Piquer presented on the first day with a speech entitled “The concept of modern machinery amongst Spanish military engineers of the 18th century”. In this speech, they presented their findings from an exhaustive study analysing over 74 projects carried out by military engineers to construct powder kegs between 1715 and 1798. The study draws attention to the fact that some of these projects did not use pointed arches nor barrel arches and comes up with the hypothesis that the option chosen by the engineers was to use elliptic, oval or catenary arches. “These methods could have been inherited from chain theory, first coined by Robert Hooke in his treaty “A description of helioscopes, and some other instruments” (1676), the lecturers explained. 

ICOFORT is an international academic meeting which aims to disseminate knowledge about the last bastion fortifications of the 18th century and the first polygonal, or tenaille, fortifications of the 19th century, which shows the transition from the end of bastion art to the beginning of polygonal art. The overall aim is to enhance and develop models to preserve and manage military heritage, both in Spain and internationally.