Quinta do Fontão

Arcos de Valdevez, Portugal

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Quinta do Fontão

Arcos de Valdevez, Portugal

Firm

Architailors

Type

Residential › Private House

YEAR

2010

BUDGET

$100K - 500K

Purpose

Recovery and expansion of a countryside house (and its adjacent buildings) in Arcos de Valdevez/Portugal.

Program

The client wished the house to have a living room, a dining room, a kitchen (which should remain at the original half-floor), two bedrooms plus, a multi-purpose room, a bathroom to serve the entire house and finally the basement transformed into a open space and multi-purpose living room.
In the annex 1 was the former cowshed and the oven room. The cowshed area should be turned into a working space with a separate toilet; the oven room should be transformed into a kitchen to support to outer space, keeping the original wood oven.
The annex 2, which was smaller, should function as a playroom.
The relationship with the green space, surrounding the house, should be privileged.

Existing elements

The propriety is surrounded by small/medium size farms where, due to the slope of the land, there were set land strips as a way to overcome height differences and allow its use.
The original buildings, in masonry stone, were in good condition allowing the team to take advantage of this feature in the project design.

Intervention criteria | Concept

The house had been subject of several interventions and expansions, over the years. Given the lack of integration and harmony of the whole, the project aimed to bring coherence by bridging the gaps caused by previous interventions.
The desired image relates to rural buildings where the use of stone and wood were always present. The repetition of strips of wood, such as, for example, in the construction of granaries, has been reproduced in order to have a contemporary image set in harmony with a more rural reality.
The quality of existing masonry/stone walls, led to propose its cleaning and restoration, what has allowed to recover the original colour and the prominent role that this material assumes in more traditional rural buildings.
The proposal sought a better use of the interior space and the exterior/interior connections, taking advantage of a higher projection, and the consequent opening to the landscape.

Credits

Client | José Casimiro de Almeida
Location | Place Zebra, Gondoriz, Arcos de Valdevez, Portugal
Project Date | 2004
Completion of the Work | 2010
Architecture Design | Carlos Praça, Eduardo Cruz - Architailors
Specialties | Pedro Almeida
Photography | CP + EC