Apartment in Rua do Crasto - Porto | PARADOXO Arquitectura

This apartment on Rua do Crasto is located in Porto, on the raised ground floor of a three-storey residential building.

The entrance to the apartment featured a screen wall of glass blocks, curving around a granite-clad pillar, and a second glance revealed the living and dining rooms separated by a corridor from the entrance to the bedrooms and lavatories. The living room had a granite-covered fireplace and extended into a small office, both facing the garden.

Together with existing materials, the desire to break the rigid pre-existing organization dictated the intervention guidelines.

The new layout establishes a wide and expansive social space for the garden and preserves the entrance to the apartment and access to the bedrooms and lavatories. This social space stands out from the remaining divisions owing to its ceiling, seemingly suspended, with cove lighting around its perimeter.

Venetian stucco is introduced along with the new layout, to cement the connection between new and pre-existing elements. The stucco envelops the social space and extends to the circulation spaces, preparing the transition to the remaining divisions painted in neutral tones. Painted in black, the doors accentuate the transition between spaces and enhance the different environments.

The final result of the intervention is a sculpted space, as is made evident by the Venetian stucco, which articulates the connection between all the materials to be preserved, the tonality and expression of the granite in particular, as much for its inert composition, as for its polished and glossy finish.