AHI Architectural Heritage Intervention

“Contributing to enhancing our heritage, as the way forward for 21 st Century architecture is our raison d’être; to emphasize a diverse, rich vision that necessarily complements the intervention is our mission, and achieving it with reflexive and purposeful efforts is the challenge”.

This project, founded in, and directed since, 2011 by Ramon Calonge, Oriol Cusidó, Marc Manzano and Jordi Portal, architects and members of the Group of Architects for the Defence and Intervention in Architectural Heritage (AADIPA), has, through the years become a platform that includes four actions that are both independent and transversal.
 
The European Award, a biennial event that brings together and showcases the multiple approaches of intervention in Europe.

The International Biennial, a framework that serves to compare and gain closer insight of quality interventions in architectural heritage in non-European countries.

The digital Archive, a live and open window that provides a panoramic view of interventions in the history of our surroundings.

The Forum, a meeting place where you can participate in on-going debates about the main preoccupations and lines of thought about interventions in architectural heritage in Europe.

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E/C House

E/C House

The basalt stone walls of an old and very small rural house on the island of Pico were the starting point for the design of this house. The project emerged from the need to maintain the expression of the existing stone in the most genuine way possible and design a house that could be made advantage of by creating more diverse and complex spaces than in the previous typology. The house, moulded on the interior of the stone walls, was designed with generous openings to allow light to enter and make possible the enjoyment of its amazing landscapes. The voids are aligned in some cases and not in others with the pre-existing parts of the old house in ruins, creating settings and new relationschips with its original limits. The project is the result of the movement of the stone walls and expossed concrete blocks, which are always moved when the need for space or for contemplation, given that the house is partially buried due to the pronounced slope of the land. We persisted with the idea of a building that could age with serenity and, precisely for that reason, we opted for concrete and basalt stone, in the hope that the passing of time would leave its mark on them and perhaps reveal through their textures a certain memory of the place.

Author

SAMI-arquitectos
Ines Vieria da Silva
Miguel Vieira

Collaborators

Team: Bruna Silva, Joao do Vale Martins, Andreia Luis, Ines Martins, Rita Maria Pinto Trainee, Daniel Mentech
Structural Engineering: Ricardo Ferro Antunes, Francisco Mendonça Santos
Fluids: Paulo Jorge Almeida Oliveira, Hugo Mendonca
Furniture: SAMI with Loja Nord

Edition

2
Ex Aequo Winner

Year

2014

City

São Roque do Pico

Country

Portugal

Surface area sqm

214

Cost €

160.000

Client

Private

© Photographer

Paulo Catrica