Gondarém

Statement on the power of architecture

The idea observes the regularized and stabilized elevation in which it is inserted. However, given the contiguous interventions to the North and South, of maintenance and integration of bathing features in the foreground and of expansion in planimetry and altimetry in the background, the adopted strategy rejects unrealistic or unrecoverable sentimental nostalgias. Between the devaluation of the existing and the conceptualization of a balanced and qualified object, the option goes for the affirmation and validation of the power of architecture. It also proves that preservation is, at times, the perversion of its intrinsic values. The exception of the lower floors creates distinct typologies of that area related to the backyard level and to the installation of qualified accesses.

The dwellings leverage the orientation of the plot to the East and West with the proximity of the sea. The plans situate the common uses to the West and the individual to the East. The formal modulation and functional structuring are clear. Abstractly, the alignments of the two contiguous planes are maintained, without mimicry. The scale of the parcel, and in addition, the partition of the main elevation generates the purification of the forms and the management of the uses of the apartments, believing in the mandatory integration — in the preservation of the shifted roofs, for example — and in the capacity of architecture’s transformation. Embedded among diverse contiguous vocabularies, the balconies contradict the neighbouring vertical logics and appear horizontal, connective and conversant.