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Willy Van Der Meeren’s Ieder Zijn Huis: Saving a Fragile Giant
Get PDFThe project for the renovation of the Willy Van Der Meeren apartment building known as Ieder Zijn Huis [“A House for Everyone”], in Brussels, raises a question that is crucial for the conservation of modern work using prefabrication techniques. The debate focuses on the original design and construction values, and above all on how best to keep them alive and contemporary despite the building's age and changing standards and techniques. In the wording of the renovation specifications, the project owner — the public company Beliris — laid stress on the importance of preserving the architectural qualities: “Given the building's importance in the architectural heritage, the renovation must reflect the original ideas of the designer, Willy Van Der Meeren”.
The point of the call for tenders was to establish an approach for the work that conserves the structure's architectural principles in terms of appearance and structural articulation, while making renovated apartments available that meet today's standards. The architecture firm Origin decided to focus on the building's values and on the comfort and convenience of the accommodation, while pursuing further the conceptual direction taken by the original designer. This meant exploring all the building's architectural and structural aspects in order to successfully showcase its qualities
João Luís Carrilho da Graça interviewed by Ana Tostões
Get PDFOn July 2016, Ana Tostões interviewed João Luís Carrilho da Graça, one of the main Portuguese contemporary architects, in order to discuss the riverside projects that he has been developing for the future of Lisbon.
João Luís Carrilho da Graça was born in 1952, Portalegre, and studied architecture at the Lisbon School of Fine Art (1977). He was assistant lecturer at the Lisbon School of Fine Art (1977-1992), full professor at the Universidade Autónoma de Lisboa (2001-2010) and the University of Évora (2005-2013). He coordinated the departments of Architecture in both institutions until 2010, and was responsible for the creation of the PhD in Architecture at the latter institution, which he also directed (2011-2013). He was professor at the University of Navarra (2005, 2007, 2010, 2014) and at the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning of Cornell University, New York (2015). Since 2014, he has been full professor at the School of Architecture, University of Lisbon. He is the principle of the architectural office João Luís Carrilho da Graça Arquitectos with an extensive work built. He was nominated and selected for the Mies van der Rohe European Prize in Architecture (1990, 1992, 1994, 1996, 2009, 2011, 2013, 2015) and received several awards, such as the AICA (1992), the Secil (1994), the FAD (1999), the Valmor (1998), the Pessoa (2008), the Order of Merit of the Portuguese Republic (1999), the Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres from the French Republic (2010) and the Medal of the Académie d’Architecture of France (2012). In 2013, he received an Honorary Doctorate degree from the School of Architecture of the University of Lisbon and in 2015 the Royal Institute of British Architects International Fellowship
Housing Reloaded Collective. Housing in Europe, 1945–2015
Get PDF“Should the grands ensembles be demolished?” This question was a major preoccupation for architects in the 1990s. Incidental as it may seem today, the question is not completely old hat. The initial, progressive shift towards the practise of maintenance is to be welcomed. But we still need to be conscious, looking forward, that the qualities or values of constructions built between 1945 and 1975 are only rarely recognized and safeguarded. A tremendous variety of strategies have been adopted, and this thematic issue on collective housing's present-day relevance proposes to revisit, on the European scale, this very multiplicity of approaches
Georges Addor’s Housing Complexes: an Observatory on the Conservation of “Large-Scale” Heritage
Get PDFThe timeliness of swiss architect Georges Addor's oeuvre is indeed vast and heterogeneous. Illuminated by a few successful operations, which should be showcased as such, the picture is, however, highly nuanced, since many questionable conversions have hurriedly followed each other in recent years. The broader reflections on the methods and techniques of preservation of the contemporary heritage that emerge from the current relevance of Georges Addor's work appear to be decisive; extended to a broader production, they deserve to be addressed without dela
The Controversial History of the “Steel and Glass” by Lods, Depondt and Beauclair. The GEAI Housing Estate La Grand’Mare in Rouen (1968–2016)
Get PDFMarked by numerous setbacks, the history of the GEAI housing estate La Grand'Mare in Rouen is troubled, even highly controversial. It clearly epitomizes the twists and turns in the debate over the preservation of postwar architecture, whose “industrialized” (often meaning “experimental”) dimension, is mistakenly made the excuse for its demolition. This is exemplified by the uncertain future of this now badly amputated pioneering housing complex, designed by Marcel Lods and his fellow architects
Apropos of Lisbon´s Modern Architecture (1925-1965)
Get PDFThe modern experience in Lisbon (and Portugal) deserves a much wider and better dissemination in international terms, not only because of its own intrinsic value, but also because of its specificity, both of which are much more relevant when one considers the country’s peripheral contingency, the respective absence of any of the main premises that generated modernity in European architecture, the political context from which it resulted and the subsequent socio-cultural conservativeness of the country, the city and many of its elites. Even though there can be no doubt, and particularly so in this century, about the growing national recognition afforded to this modern architectural heritage, as expressed by the legal protection given to many of its buildings (which in itself is inseparable from the fertile research and documentation originating, above all, from the academic community), it is no less certain that much of this heritage is located in areas that are themselves being subjected to widespread and highly volatile processes of urban renewal
Gonçalo Byrne interviewed by Ana Tostões
Get PDFOn July 2016, Ana Tostões interviewed the architect Gonçalo Byrne who has been deeply reflecting, writing and interviewing in the city through projects of reference, in order to broadly understand the evolution of the city, with an emphasis on the modernity of the 1758 Baixa Pombalina Plan, and its contemporary and future potential, grounded in its roots.
Gonçalo Byrne was born in 1941, Alcobaça, studied architecture at the Lisbon School of Fine Art (1968) and is Doctor Honoris Causa (2005) from the Technical University of Lisbon and the University of Alghero. He has been professor in several universities such as the University of Navarra, the University of Alghero, the Accademia di Architettura di Mendrisio, the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, the École Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne, the Università IUAV di Venezia, the Harvard University, the Politecnico di Milano and the University of Coimbra. He is the principal of Gonçalo Byrne Arquitectos, in Lisbon, with an extensive work both in terms of scale, program and context, including urban planning and building design, urban renewal and project management such as the renewal of the Bank of Portugal headquarters (with João Pedro Falcão de Campos), the renewal of the Thalia Theatre in Lisbon (with Barbas Lopes Arquitectos), the renewal of the Machado de Castro National Museum in Coimbra, the renewal of the Trancoso Castel and the renewal of the Santa Maria Abbey surroundings in Alcobaça. He has received the AICA Award (1988), the Valmor Award (2000), the Gold Medal from the France’s Académie d’architecture Française (2000) and the Piranesi Prix de Rome (2014)
Restoration of the Cercle de L’Ermitage in Epesses, Switzerland
Get PDFIn 1935, Alberto Sartoris transformed an old mill into a private club for artists: le Cercle de l’Ermitage. The young architect conceptualized the space as a manifesto of rationalistic architecture. The resolutely modernist choice of the intervention contrasted with the rural and bucolic existing building.
In 1971, the work disappeared under fake rustic decoration and everybody considered it lost, only remaining one of the most famous axonometries of the Italian master. Forty-five years later, the work reappears miraculously while the space is under transformation into a private residence. The demolition work has revealed an unexpected amount of original elements, which will allow a faithful and rigorous restoration of the Cercle de l’Ermitage
City Architecture. The Example of Infante Santo Avenue (1945–1955)
Get PDFInfante Santo was idealized as a modern way of living in a modern avenue, within the existing city. This comprehensive project of city architecture, coordinated by the architect Alberto Pessoa (1919–1985) and built during the 1950s, embodies a site-specific attitude of cultural and urban continuity. During its planning and construction, this major urban project was first exhibited in Lisbon, in 1951, and then in Rome, 1955, London, 1956, Washington, 1958, Brussels, 1958, and also published in the French magazine L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui, in 1960. Today, the absence of a strategy for approaching Infante Santo as a whole is compromising its adaptation for the future
Brutalism and Nature. The Gulbenkian Foundation Buildings (1959-1969)
Get PDFThe Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation headquarters and museum complex (1959–1969) headed a fundamental role in building science in Portugal, as it contributed to the accomplishment of a Modern Movement design committed with a high level of construction quality, showing that there was more beyond Modern Movement formalism. Inaugurated in 1969, it was designed to create a pleasant environment, providing prospects from inside at various angles to the grove of trees and the surrounding land. As a mega-structure designed under a multi-disciplinary design and construction team it achieved a high level of technical excellence and comfort, whilst beautifully linking the building and garden.
Located in central Lisbon, within a park with an area of 7.5 ha, occupying an area of 25.000 m2, it was designed by the architects Alberto Pessoa (1919–1985), Pedro Cid (1925–1983) and Ruy Jevis d’Athouguia (1917–2006) with the collaboration of the landscape designers Ribeiro Barreto (1924–2013) and Gonçalo Ribeiro Telles (1922–). The construction gathered an international interdisciplinary team of specialists. The most up-to-date techniques were adopted, including reinforced and pre-stressed concrete in its construction. Some figures illustrate the volume of these buildings: 150,000 m3 of excavation, 45,000 m3 of concrete, 3,200 t of steel, 100 km of power cables, 50,000 m of air conditioning pipes and 3,500 kW of installed electrical capacity.
The architectural design expresses the structure. The aim of having a dominant horizontal line that guaranteed the image of a low building hugging the land and the wish to emphasize the long slabs of concrete that constituted the visible image of the built complex called for a very creative structural concept. The impact that the complex has had and the way in which it has manifested the effectiveness of its qualities, such as formal sobriety and restraint, have confirmed the close relationship between the conception process and the construction site. With its garden it has created the very image of the prestige and innovation of the Foundation itself