House in Paço de Arcos by Jorge Mealha Arquitecto

5 February 2011

Portuguese studio Jorge Mealha Arquitecto have completed a house in Lisbon, Portugal, featuring clusters of rectangular volumes and courtyards.

Called House in Paço de Arcos, the building sits on a sloping site and the volumes have been arranged in such a way to maximise the amount of sunlight that enters the interior.

A central glazed walkway connects two parts of the structure.

The house is finished primarily in white.

Photographs are by Fernando Guerra, courtesy of the architects.

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The following information is from the architects:

House in PaÁo de Arcos

Located at Alto do Lagoal in PaÁo de Arcos, a neighborhood of Lisbon facing the sea, this house has been built on a sloping site and proposes as main strategy an arrangement of several solids in order to attenuate the overall mass due to the functional program requested by the client.

This arrangement of different solids and voids, uses large plain surfaces and some in-between tensioned spaces to let light draw or reflect on the objects, emphasizing geometry and proposing a changeable reading of form and space during the day.

Some surfaces, covered by metal screening/shading devices, create large smooth textured plans on two facades of the house hiding windows and enhancing form, acting also as a kind of diaphragm device to filter the views between interior and exterior.

Also act as a passive sunshade control between internal and external spaces.

Some circulations, as the staircase and main corridor are built in white painted 10mm metal sheet slightly detached from the walls, leaving opportunity for light, caught by the long skylight to pass in between and spread to the lower floors.

The external envelope, a ìin situî concrete structure, integrates a double row masonry of perforated ceramic blocs as external walls, including inner rigid thermal insulation panels.

External walls finishes are in cement plaster painted.

Windows are in standard natural aluminum color profiles integrating double thermal glass.

In the interior, the walls main finish is plaster painted in white except in the bathrooms where the walls are covered in white/grey natural striped marble.