Diffuse Mirror

Portugal

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Diffuse Mirror

Portugal

Firm

António Costa Lima Arquitectos

Type

Cultural › Religious

STATUS

Built

YEAR

2024

SIZE

0 sqft - 1000 sqft

BUDGET

$10K - 50K

The chapel is placed on the edge of the dam like a pier. Strong shadow inside contrasts the omnipresent light around. The only window shows the sky through the water.
The shape consists of a small structure of pine wood poles spiked on the water bank.
Its 20m2 surface encloses the space with a semi-opaque palisade of rustic wooden conical sticks only broken by the entry steps at the roof level and by one horizontal window on the floor allowing an exclusive view of the water surface.
The interstices of light pierce the interior creating different tones, reflections and glitters that depend on the time of the day and the season of the year. With the winter rains the water level come up to floor leaving a gap with a couple of inches. In the summer the cross which is the one pole that holds all the building appears almost completely and scarcely touches the water.
The chapel creates a chamber where the five senses are fully activated in a clear counterpoint to the wide and bright landscape of the dam transporting the mind to hidden places of memory: the smell of the water bank, the moving glitter of the water, the rough surface of imperfect wooden posts, the resonance box with the sounds of water…
The symbolism of water is emphasized by the cross that precedes and protrudes from the dam surface as the only structural support on this side of the building.
The cross confuses the scale and invites for tactile interaction.
The place relates to the healing harbours of Galilee where the large surface of the water reminds that "For now we see a reflection as in a diffused mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. So faith, hope, love remain, these three; but the greatest of these is love." (St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians, Chapter 13). So the third column of the tripod building, the thicker one, the cross, is subtly carved with the name “Agape” (“love” translated from Greek).
The building offers a place to pause, a space of silence where all the senses are called to reflection and prayer. The encounter with water evokes the deepest memories in a "dive" into the subconscious.
Since it's a pier in which the only material used is conical posts made of autoclaved wood (thin and irregular pine trunks). The effect of this choice is revealed in a chapel of “imperfect” but sustainable surfaces, integrated into the lakeshore as if it were born from it.