Text description provided by the architects. Monte Gordo is characterized by being a former fishing village located between the ocean and a vast pine forest.
The intervention predicted a complex of 12 controlled cost apartment buildings under a Housing Development Contract regime, set in a neighborhood with services (crèche), leisure areas (football grounds), shops and areas of collective use (church).
The programme established typologies of one, two and three bedrooms, distributed in 170 dwellings planned for multi-family housing on buildings with 4 floors.
Some lots has only one building, while the others accommodates several contiguous buildings and both share the same car park in the communal basement underneath.
The façades are the protagonists of this project, since the main façade and the rear façade are differentiated although they have a common element: the balcony. Each apartment can enjoy the outside areas as the main elevation has a balcony all along its length, communicating with the kitchens and living rooms.
The opposite elevation has vertical spans, adjusting to different sizes of balconies and alternately conferring a constant rhythm, disguising the more private areas.
Inside the apartments have a hall/corridor from which lead off the living room, kitchen, bedrooms and bathrooms.
A good articulation between areas is assured, avoiding intersections between private and social areas, which have larger spans hidden at the back of the balcony boxes, in this case for all the residents.
The small balconies of the rear elevation are exclusively for individual use, promoting a good spatial distinction that evokes greater privacy in the home.
Conceptually, the interior is extended to the exterior through the balcony areas, reproducing the meteorological culture of a place where it is always possible to enjoy the open air.
