SetúbalPT
The region between Lisbon and Setúbal offers valuable insight into the ways contemporary Portuguese architecture engages with questions of housing, care, education, and territorial development. Beyond the metropolitan context, different spatial challenges emerge, placing particular emphasis on the relationship between buildings, landscape, and community.
The selected projects demonstrate how architecture can respond to societal needs while maintaining strong spatial and cultural ambitions. Quinta da Malagueira by Álvaro Siza Vieira serves as an important reference point within the programme. Internationally recognised as a landmark housing development, it made a significant contribution to debates on social housing, urban growth, and collective forms of living, and remains a relevant case study within contemporary architectural discourse.
The work of Aires Mateus provides further insight into contemporary approaches to housing and care. The House in Barreiro and the Home for the Elderly in Alcácer do Sal illustrate how architecture can create meaningful living environments through a thoughtful use of space, light, and materiality. The School of Arts at the University of Évora by Ventura Trindade Arquitectos also offers an opportunity to explore the role of architecture within educational institutions and the relationship between learning, social interaction, and the built environment.
A central theme of this journey is residential architecture and the relationship between architecture and territory. Over the past two decades, the Comporta region has emerged as an international reference for contemporary housing design. Within its distinctive landscape of pine forests, rice fields, and Atlantic coastline, Portuguese and international architects have explored new ways of living rooted in a strong connection to place.
Particular attention is given to a series of private residential projects in Comporta, including the work of Vincent Van Duysen. These projects, which are rarely accessible to the public, offer a unique opportunity to study an architectural practice in which dwelling, landscape, and lifestyle are closely intertwined. They help explain why Comporta is today considered one of the most compelling contexts for contemporary residential architecture in Europe.