Alvaro Siza: The Latest Architecture and News

In an essay and accompanying mini-documentary film by Ellis Woodman for The Architectural Review, Siza's iconic Quinta da Malagueira housing estate (1973-1977) in Évora, Portugal, is comprehensively explored and examined with a refreshingly engaging critical weight. Rather than develop multi-story housing in the sensitive landscape around the city, Siza proposed "a plan that distributed the programme between two fields composed of low-rise terraced courtyard houses." As a result, the arrangement of these structures adjust to the "undulating topography ensuring that the narrow, cobbled streets along which the houses are distributed always follow the slope."

As is made clear in the film (above), one of the remarkable aspects about the Quinta da Malagueira estate is that it is "governed by a third layer of infrastructure" which takes the form of "an elevated network of conduits that distributes water and electricity [...] much in the manner of a miniature aqueduct." For Siza, this was a logical move as it provided the cheapest means of distributing utilities around the complex. Woodman ultimately concludes that "Siza’s work at Malagueira invites a reading less as a fixed artefact and rather as one episode in the site’s ongoing transformation."

Read extracts of what Pier Vittorio Aureli, Tony Fretton, and John Tuomey (among others) have said about Siza's œuvre and approach after the break.

Álvaro Siza has won top honors in the “2014 Fritz Höger Awards for Excellence in Brick Architecture.” The awards, now in their third edition, highlight projects that harness the creative potential of brick. Projects from New Delhi, Barcelona and Frankfurt have all been awarded gold and silver prizes.

View all the winners, after the break.

After inaugurating his first building in China – “The Building on the Water” – Álvaro Siza has just announced his second project in the country, again in collaboration with Portuguese architect Carlos Castanheira. This time the two architects will develop a museum for Hangzhou Art Academy.

The new museum - which will have approximately 15,000 sqm, a total area similar to that of Serralves Foundation building – will host an important collection of pieces from the famous German school of arts and design, Bauhaus, founded by Walter Gropius in 1919.

We are excited to share these exclusive photos taken by Fernando Guerra | FG+SG of Portuguese architect Álvaro Siza’s first project in China: The Building on the Water.

Evoking the image of a dragon perched elegantly on water, the contours of the building seem to move gently in a perfect synergy between local symbolism and the subtle elements of Siza. Snaking around, the form escapes formal convention, emerging as an autonomous entity that contrasts with the orthogonal form of the factory complex. The delicate transition geometry of curves and bridges that connect the different spaces and pavements makes this project one of the most striking examples of Siza’s distinctive architecture. 

Through different shades, reflections and his unmatched composition of light and shadows, Fernando Guerra’s striking images show a poetic scene and the perfect relationship between the building and its environment. We can envision the changes and transitions that the white concrete building goes through as a result of its contact with the water throughout the day.

Read on after the break to see the exclusive images...

Today, Pritzker Prize-winning architect Álvaro Siza and architect Carlos Castanheira will inaugurate the Taifong Golf Club, in Changhua, Taiwan.

The two Portuguese architects began the recently-completed project in 2009. The clubhouse includes spaces for recreational and cultural events and activities. The building demonstrates a rich relationship between the landscape and local culture.

Architects: Álvaro Siza and Carlos Castanheira
Local Partner | Project Management and Construction Supervision: Ho+Hou Studio Architects and Studio Base Architects
Images of the project—kindly shared with us by architecture photographer Fernando Guerra | FG+SG—can be seen after the break.

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What influence do art and space have on the contemporary architectural design process? MoMA's most recent exhibition on architecture and design Conceptions of Space strives to answer this question. Themed under the umbrella of spatial relations, Curator Pedro Gadanho ruminates on the subject in a broad and philosophical sense. The exhibition delves into the topic using an interdisciplinary approach, incorporating research from French philosopher Michel Foucault on the subject of the expanded field. The exhibition aims to explore the relationship between the development of space and its deep-seated roots in the creative arts.

Update: CCA releases statement from Siza.

Earlier this week we announced that Portuguese architect Álvaro Siza was considering donating his archive to institutions outside of his home country of Portugal. Finally, after much discussion and speculation, Siza has arrived at a decision.

Siza will donate one part of the archive to two institutions in Portugal: the Fundação Gulbenkian in Lisbon and the Fundação de Serralves in Porto. The other part of the archive will be given to the Canadian Center for Architecture (CCA) in Montreal.

Videos

The Mies Crown Hall Americas Prize (MCHAP) has just announced the seven finalists - drawn from a shortlist of 36 projects - at an event in Santiago, Chile.

To determine the finalists, the five jury members - Francisco Liernur, Sarah Whiting, Wiel Arets, Dominique Perrault, and Kenneth Frampton - spent the last twelve days visiting projects, speaking with the architects, users and owners of the spaces, and entering into intense debate among each other.

As jury member Dominique Perrault noted, “There’s a lot of means by which to evaluate projects - models, drawings, images - but we took all opportunities to test the quality of the architecture. In the end, only by visiting can you sense the ‘touch of god’ - the presence of the building itself in the context.”

The resulting finalists show tremendous variety - in terms of scale, place, typology, program, materials, etc. - making the task of choosing a winner all the more challenging. See all seven finalists, as well as a video of Kenneth Frampton discussing the selection process, after the break.

Today marks the 81^st birthday of Portuguese modernist Álvaro Siza. Originally slated to become a sculptor, Siza’s switch-over to architecture took place early in his career, after experiencing the work of Antoni Gaudí (whose birthday he shares). Since then, he has risen to become one of the most respected architects of the era, winning the Pritzker Prize in 1992.

Wiel Arets, Dean of the College of Architecture at Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) and Dirk Denison, Director of the Mies Crown Hall Americas Prize (MCHAP), have announced the inaugural MCHAP shortlist – 36 “Outstanding Projects” selected from the 225 MCHAP nominees.

“The rich diversity of these built works is a testament to the creative energy at work in the Americas today,” said Arets. “When viewed alongside the innovative work by the MCHAP.emerge finalists and winner, Poli House by Mauricio Pezo and Sofia von Ellrichshausen which we honored in May, we see the evolution of a distinctly American conversation about creating livable space.” See all 36 winners after the break.

In this video, produced by Hugo Oliveira, Portuguese architect Álvaro Siza denounces the "hyper-specialization" of architecture, outlining its academic roots as well as its practical implications for practice. Siza mentions how, in Portugal, a law was considered to limit architects to their specific specialities - exterior architects could not design interiors, for example. According to Siza, this tendency towards "hyper" or over specialization is unfortunate, as it gives rise to the segmentation of the discipline into subcategories - interior architecture, exterior architecture, landscape architecture, etc. - that undermine collaboration and team work.

Also make sure to check out the first part of this interview, where Siza discusses the obsolescence of buildings.

This Financial Times article describes the Post-Recession paradigm shift occurring in Portuguese architecture -- from construction to landscape, large to small. Pritzker Prize winners Alvaro Siza and Eduardo Souto de Moura have been leading this "micro" trend, designing hotels with exceptional materiality and craft. We've decided to round up some of these extraordinary structures, including: Casa Na Areia and Cabanas no Rio by Aires Mateus, Jorge Sousa Santos’ Rio do Prado, the Ecork Hotel by Jose Carlos Cruz and Villa Extramuros by Jordi Fornells. Last but not least, is ArchDaily’s building of the year for hospitality architecture -- the Tree Snake Houses from father Luís Rebelo de Andrade and son Tiago Rebelo de Andrade.