Domus 1071 is on newsstands, an issue dedicated to Portuguese architecture

The Guest Editor dedicates this month’s editorial to the heritage of Portuguese architecture and its solid fascination demonstrated over the last decades of building sites, using “familiar words in situations that give them new strength”.

Landscape architect João Nunes explains how the concept of landscape is inexorably linked to the lives of human communities, their efforts to survive in a hostile and unforgiving nature. Specifically, the relationship between time and landscape is evident in the construction formulas that govern it.

Architect and curator, Pedro Gadanho writes about the enormous scope of the changes that the building industry will face in the next two decades. “With the inevitable need to decarbonise our economies, the world of architecture requires a change of course comparable - if not even more rapid - to that provoked a century ago by Modernism and the International Style”.

Jorge Figueira, architect and professor at the University of Coibra, introduces the architect explored in this month’s issue: Eduardo Souto de Moura. Figueira analyses how those who embark on a professional path tend to start by exploring, then progress towards an established style, in Souto de Moura’s case the opposite is true: after years in which the same themes were repeated almost obsessively, there is now a greater willingness to embrace instability and experimentation.

On Monte Castro, embedded in a disused granite quarry in Dume, Eduardo Souto de Moura places one of his best known and technically most complex works: the municipal stadium of Braga. Constructed for the 2004 European Football Championship, it has a capacity of 30,286 people, divided into only two steep, mirrored stands.

This was followed by La Comédie, in Auvergne, a transformation and extension of the building intended to house La Comédie de Clermont-Ferrand, one of the decentralised scène nationale defined by the French Ministry of Culture.

In the square, the building rises up with its height and language lending it a public dimension. Another, more distant scale is also present: the view from the top floor of the restaurant over the Bruges skyline, which is punctuated by the city’s three iconic towers.

While the Quinta da Extrema winery, under completion, lies in the Douro valley, with its horizontal volumes mimicking the gentle forms of the surrounding hills, in Mealhada Souto de Moura has designed a veritable underground architecture with only the many ventilation chimneys emerging above grade.

The Musée de L'Elysée and the MUDAC, a recent project finalised in 2021 in Lausanne by the Aires Mateus duo, is volumetrically marked by a white cube uniting two historical institutions and is marked on the façades by a fault line emphasising the presence of the internal public space and separating areas with different lighting requirements.

Atelier Data works on the renovation and extension of the residence part of a former agricultural estate emphasising the stately characteristics of the existing building, creating a new relationship with the landscape.

Carvalho Araújo presents Casa na Caniçada, a monomaterial concrete volume, which visually connects the nearby body of water and the forest through large glazed openings and develops a three-storey living programme that plays with the topography of the site.

Closing the section, Pancho Guedes tells us about an installation in Algarve originally conceived as temporary, made permanent by Ressano Garcia Arquitectos, leaving intact its ability to amplify sounds from a fault line communicating with the ocean.

The Portuguese architect refines his projects through gestures of anticipation and memory in A4 sketchbooks. A unique working method that illustrates the principles of his architecture.

Materials, light and geometry were still the basis of Riva’s last projects:the Giustini / Stagetti gallery in Rome and the furnishings he designed between 2018 and 2021.

Francesco Franchi writes about the Alliance Graphique Internationale, which chose Italy from 18 to 23 September to host the congress of the international elite association that brings together and represents the best graphic artists, designers and illustrators from around the world.

Alessandro Benetti describes the Äng restaurant, a project by Norm Architects and Keiji Ashizawa Design, set in the rural landscape of south-west Sweden.

A conversation with Claudio Luti, president of Kartell, about the importance of democratic design and innovation related to a product’s lifespan.

Elena Sommariva with a text dedicated to the playground, the lever to better understand society, read the transformations of urban space and, finally, reflect on the culture of childhood.

A design week has been held in Jerusalem since 2011, attracting 40,000 visitors, now in its 11th edition, the sixth international. This year, more than 150 designers inhabited the spaces of the historic Hansen House in the elegant Talbiya quarter between 23 and 30 June.

Eduardo Souto de Moura, Bruges Meeting & Convention Centre (BMCC), Bruges, Belgium, 2021