This paper examines the importance of the social processes -inherent to the drive to modernise the state undertaken under the first government of Carlos Ibanez del Campo- that surrounded the gestation of works of institutional architecture as an expression of political aestheticisation. Primary and secondary sources were used to uncover a series of works of institutional architecture that laid the foundations for the modernisation and standardisation of school buildings in Chile at the beginning of the twentieth century. The results revealed the significant role played by The Foundation Company, the Ameri-can company responsible for the Standard Schools, which were expressions of political aestheticisation that set the guidelines for educational architecture in Chile for the fol-lowing five decades.