São Bento Residences

The São Bento Residences project is located on a notable corner of Porto's Historic Centre, next to the city’s main station and just a few meters from the old cathedral. This corner results from a 1940’s demolition plan for the development of a Modern avenue. Assuming its contemporaneity, and avoiding any kind of architectural pastiche, the project seeks to establish continuities between a remnant granite façade of the 18th century and the vast mass of an escarpment which resulted from that urban demolition. A monolithic block, built in exposed concrete, hammered “in situ”, conforms itself to those prevailing shapes and scales. The rhythmic composition of its main façade reinvents the vertical proportions and the refined brass detailing of Porto’s traditional architecture.