The objective:
The main goal of this project was prospected through the differentiation of local housing spaces, for a public that appreciates comfort, but also the innovative elements that create sophistication, surprise or mystery in their lifestyle.
As such, the aromatisation of the space and sheets has been integrated within the concept, as well as the absolute autonomy of access to the different apartments and the interior design that is almost fully customised. The recovery of antique furnishings and the reutilisation of demolished stone has created a space that is framed within the concepts of environmental sustainability, but that also respects and recreates the spirit of the environment in which it was originally inserted.
The local housing units have therefore been brought to life through fragranced apartments, with small gardens in the no. 19 and pool and garden in no. 35, wi-fi, reception area, access through codes generated upon reservation, thus allowing remote contact with guests and maintaining a permanent flow of information regarding their needs, while simultaneously minimising costs.
The environment
and the spirit of the space:
the living experience, History
and landscape.
A place can be defined as an “identity, relational and historical space”I, endowed with value and symbolically occupied, as opposed to an empty space, undifferentiated and devoid of meaning.
The spirit of the space or the “place endowed with an aura”II according to Oliveira Jorge, is a place occupied and re-occupied for a long period of time, displaying the markings of time and of Man. It’s an imagined and re-imagined place through time that has transited into Man’s subjectivity.
He who visits a place, brings with him the stories he listened to, the perceptions he formulated, and he sees and interprets the places through the matrix of his experiences and values.
Óbidos lives in the imagination of the millions of people that have visited it. They have stored it in their memories, interpreting and making it part of their own subjectivity.
Óbidos is a multi-coloured reality that surprises us at every step, and that in its richness and diversity, transports us to the time by which it is defined: the middle ages.
When one is set with the task of rehabilitating a construction inside medieval walls, which display a consolidated complexity and an almost absolute coherence, the challenge resides in having to meddle with its perfection. And consequently, the need to surprise urgently becomes a pre-requisite.
The rehabilitation presupposes the existence of a previous building, of a space that has already been lived in and that transports in itself the option of occupation, functionalities and context evaluations that live in the past. It brings several pre-established variables, filled with subjectivity that need to be respected and valued. It’s like a puzzle already initiated but that contains several options for its ending.
The rehabilitation is the re-creation of a pre-established place that balances in between the past and the present. The diversity of shapes, colours and volumes is then added, converging towards a sustainable future.
The achievement of such complexity demands simple solutions regarding the chosen materials and colours, the volumetry and the addition of functional elements. The goal is to achieve a coherent result, integrated and aesthetically valued.
As such, the rehabilitation of obsolete and deteriorated constructions is a process of adequacy and re-creation of the new construction to new functionalities and new aesthetics. These must respect the necessities and patterns of comfort of the inhabitants, in harmony with the use that has been defined to it.
Through the recycling of materials, it is also a process that can be framed under the principles of environmental and social sustainability as it contributes to the reduction of consumption of new natural resources and therefore, to the minimisation of environmental impact caused by the extraction and industrialisation of raw materials.
Re-using demolished stone and restoring all of the furniture that was found on site has not only allowed to preserve materials but also the work and history they carried. This enables the integration and valuation of aesthetics and values, culminating in an interaction between the past and the present that challenges the spirit and creates mystery and subjectivity.
Ana Cristina Costa
I Augé, Marc
II Oliveira, jorge
