The project comprises the extension of a single-family house in the Marechal Gomes da Costa Economic Housing Estate, a neighborhood in Porto designed in 1947 and built between 1948 and 1950. The complex consists of semi-detached houses, each with two floors and three-sided pitched roofs.

A numerous family motivated the need to transform the building. A new body - a mixed concrete and wood structure with a flat roof and a lower height than the original eaves - turns up as an extension of the façades’ alignments, establishing a connection on the first floor to an existing outbuilding, which has also been refurbished.

Thus, the planes of the outer walls spread into the new construction, acquiring a new texture resulting from the stereotomy of the exposed concrete blocks cladding the building, and simultaneously promoting a dialogue of continuity and a clear distinction between the original building and its extension.

Assorted items in exposed concrete can be spotted in the new elevations: a plinth in continuity with the foundation of the existing house; a canopy protecting a new entrance door; a slab that connects to the existing outbuilding; and the lintels of the upper floor openings. The size of these openings replicates the size of the windows in the existing house, with a distinct material, anodized aluminum instead of painted wood.

Inside, the original layout of the house remains practically whole. A series of reinforcements, demolitions, suppressions and cuts in masonry and carpentry elements - which seem to ignore pre-existing features - promote a negotiation between the mismatches of old and new, while allowing some spaces to be adapted to new housing functions. These surgical-like operations redefine the language of the interior spaces, in a lexicon that oscillates between the preservation of the original compositional elements and a set of rigorous (but playful) incisions. In the extension, concrete and timber structural components are left visible, creating a clear distinction with other areas of the house.

The house is reinvented, adapting to new times and uses, growing inwards and outwards, always remaining Economical, always part of the Neighborhood.



Architecture:
Francisco Ascensão
José Luís Tavares
Patrícia Morais

Structural and hydraulic engineer:
Manuel Ribeiro

MEP engineer:
Fátima Relvas

Location:
Porto, Portugal

Date:
2013-2020

Area:
216 m2

Construction:
C3R
Cousil