Almost a month after its last collapse, this Tuesday the demolition work of what remains of the old building of the Higher Institute of Design (ISDi).
“The demolition actions of the premises occupied by the Higher Institute of Industrial Design (ISDI) began, New Town Council. The work is carried out by the company GEICONS”, reads the brief publication in Facebook of the Municipal Assembly of Popular Power Central Havana.
A part of the building – which had already suffered a previous collapse in San Carlos and presented immediate danger towards Belascoaín Street, a busy road in the capital – collapsed in the early hours of January 10, on the side facing Maloja Street.
In January 2025, the fall of a segment of the building left no fatalities, but it obstructed four families’ access to their homes. According to the publication of reporter Lázaro Manuel Alonso in Facebookthe collapsed area had been declared in a state of collapse for several months, when the workers of the GECAL company began work on the progressive demolition of the structure.
Some time after the collapse, the journalist then added, construction companies were in charge of removing nearly 800 cubic meters of rubble from the site.
But since July 2024, independent media reported another collapse inside the building’s headquarters, which It closed its doors in 2022 due to a complicated architectural failure.
The Board of Directors then issued a releasein which it ensured the continuity of teaching activities in “other spaces at the UH”, despite the closure.
Construction errors and lack of maintenance
Multiple modifications, such as the incorporation of two new levels and a theater, ended up putting the initial structure of the building at risk.
“As there were two different types of construction, the beam and board mezzanines and the reinforced concrete ones above, the structure was much more overloaded,” explained engineer Ramón Casado Morales, project director of the Specialized Construction Services company (Secons), told Canal Caribe.
According to Casado Morales, problems derived from the lack of maintenance were added to the building’s problems, taking into account the 165 years of existence of the property.
What will replace ISDi?
Although so far no details have been offered about the time that the demolition work will take, before starting any project here, specialists must make an opinion to evaluate the conditions in which the property will be left.
Although it has been a few years since the now demolished building, located in Belascoaín, between Estrella and Maloja, Central Havana, did not host classes or the movement of teachers and students, for many it is still the ISDi.
Inaugurated in 1860 as a Military Hotel and Officers’ Club, the building went through multiple uses before housing the ISDi: it was an asylum for widows and orphans, headquarters of the General Staff of the American troops and later of the Ministry of Public Health.
In 1984 it became the headquarters of the Institute, adapted with new levels and a theater that overloaded its original structure.
After the accelerated deterioration, it had to close its doors in 2022 due to a “complicated architectural failure” that ended up taking its toll and causing successive collapses that affected the surrounding streets and homes, until reaching the point where it is now: just rubble.
