House Rehabilitation in Figueira da Foz, Portugal | Maria José Pinto Leite

This is a portuguese tradicional housing recovery, located in center of Portugal, aging about 100 years. This house, in previous generations, had already belonged to the family of the client. Located in the countryside but near the beach, customers wanted a holiday and weekend house with conditions to invite family and friends.

The House was practically in ruins. Having  fully  falled  the original cover system, worsened  the condition of the interior elements because they were exposed to the bad weather. We recovered  the four exterior walls and the two interior locking master walls . These walls are in stone masonry, with about of 70 cm thickness. Covering have wood structure and clay tile.

The architectural project recovered  once existing volumes and  used  traditional materials. Therefore adopted materials and constructive solutions identical to originals, including the restoration of some existing elements. It was necessary to redo the full coverage, taking advantage of the attic to the roof for adding a new bedroom  floor.

The work of rehabilitation proposal is based on the constructive, functional and aesthetic upgrading of the entire property, ensuring the preservation of the existing architectural elements, optimizing  the response  to seismic  actions for adoption of reinforcement structural solutions. By maintaining the tradicional house look in the exterior side, the interiors are now bigger, lighter and versatile. All equipment and furniture was designed in the project, including bookshelves, wardrobes and bunk beds.

In this project, was given importance to sustainability. The climatizing system takes advantage of south solar power, including the pool heater.

The intervention included:

§  Rehabilitation of the interior floor of the ground floor to affectation  of social areas, including the installation of a kitchen / dinning  room, double height ceiling social room, social games room, laundry room and two bedrooms and sanitary for health visitors.

§  Rehabilitation of the entire patio and garden, located  in the south side, where lies an outdoor covered patio area, garden with fruit trees, barbecue and pool;

§  Use of the attic  in attic typology, affection to private rest areas with the installation of four suites and office area.