Estrela Cementery / Pedro Pacheco + Marie Clément
Architects: Pedro Pacheco + Marie Clément
Location: Estrela, Moura, Portugal
Programme: Cemetery
Constructed Area: 820 sqm
Budget: US $ 570,000.00
Anthropology: Clara Saraiva
Engineering: G.O.P. – Gabinete de Organização e Projectos, Lda.
Lighting engeneering: Raul Serafim
Lndscape Architecture: Sebastião Pereira
Client: E.D.I.A. – Empresa de Desenvolvimento e Infra-estruturas do Alqueva, S.A.
Project year: 2000-2001
Construction year: 2002-2004
Photographs: Pedro Pacheco
The cemetery and mortuary chapel constitute an ensemble of two enclosed spaces, built in a holm-oak field. One of the holm-oaks becomes part of the enclosure, as an element of the cemetery anchorage, transforming the chapel patio into an important shadow space. This gesture acquires a structural significance, either in the dialogue between built and landscape, or in the character of the chapel interior space, built with holm-oak wood, recycled from the fell of trees in the new lagoon river-side.
Like the cemetery of Luz, the elements dislocated from the old cemetery, witch characterize the cemetery typology, are interpreted in the design of the new dislocated cemetery. The spatial intensity held in the shadow spaces between walls, patios and white surfaces, densify the sense of this place, like silence intervals.
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34 comments »
another siza wannabe
i seriously can´t understand why people keep insisting that most portuguese architects are siza wannabes… it’s only normal that portuguese architecture is very uniform nationwide, since the portuguese architecture culture is all about integration in the environment, not distubing the surroundings, using cheap and well known contruction techics, etc. the white comes from the extreme hot tempretures that the south of the country suffers during the summer , it’s a question of common sense, it’s not about siza, or souto moura. i think people should ask themselfes why does almost every architect in portugal seems to make the same choices, instaed of pre conceived ideas. if u notice siza doesn’t have the same kind of material choice on his dutch work….
@ Chris
Siza didn’t invent this language. This is architecture of “Escola do Porto”. If a Portuguese architect does this type of archicture, doesn’t mean that he wants to be like Siza. This is a typical architecture in the north of the country (although this work is in south).
So stop doing this mediocre comments, and study before saying anything.
well andre, like it or not the truth is portuguese architecture is full of siza (and souto de moura) wannabes and this project is a classical example.
and it has nothing to do with ‘integration in the environment, not distubing the surroundings, using cheap and well known contruction techics’ or whatever.
‘the white comes from the extreme hot tempretures that the south of the country suffers during the summer’ ok, but is the north as hot as the south? it’s not! but he (siza) uses the exact same materials as in the south (eg. vieira castro house or avelino duarte house among many, many others)
‘if u notice siza doesn’t have the same kind of material choice on his dutch work’ he used bricks. how original is that?
‘i think people should ask themselfes why does almost every architect in portugal seems to make the same choices’ don’t you know why? you should…
note that I don’t dislike siza. though not very innovative when choosing the materials he’s a great architect!
I just don’t like copycats!
if you’re one, at least do it well! ’cause this cemetery is just a bad copy.
Nice project
Amen
I don’t get it. Is being part of the aesthetic of the south europe(Siza wannabe) really a default.
More than Siza this work is close from Campo Baeza’s work and meany other that work with light as a pure material and simplicity of forms..etc.. which come from the white periode of the modern mouvement in the 20′ 30′. Almost one century ago…but also direcly connected with the traditional mediteranean architecture
In this field the possibilities are infinite. It may not be just “pastiches” “copies” or “wannabe”
Is being original the purpose of architecture ? I don’t know
Might be a bit immature (or not ?).
It’s one of the différence beetwin the occidental way of thinking Art and the oriental since the Renaissance.
A pianiste gives his interpretation of a partition and finds his way to originality throught the constraincts.
Don’t be so superficial.
But still, i don’t always get why Siza is so repetiting
well chris, i’m sorry u think that way, if u think good architecture is doing something that nobody has ever done i’m sorry too tell u but that doesn’t happen. and sure those two have great influence in portuguese arquitecture, but nobody is trying to copy them blindly. now, if u dont’ understand what integration means i’ll explain it to you. imagine a old mediterranean lady going to a little village’s cemetery, and when she arrives she bangs her head against a high tech, full of steel and polymers derivated materials. and this doesn’t have to be an old lady. do you think she would be confortable in such a place? a place that’s built for meditating and moaning? we´r not discussing a siza work, we’r discussing this work (i’ll get to that later. it’s not always about the fisical surroundings… the use of simple and pure forms helps that metafisical caracter of the program, apealing to perfection thus god. about siza and his white, he does often use white plaster walls in the north, but if u notice the fisical surroundings that’s the material that has been used and aproved by the whole country. do you get now why he uses brick in holland and granit in santiago??
to fran: thank you for being open minded, and thinking twice about why things are as they are.
and yes i am portuguese, although i’m sorry that i have to dismistify this kind of thinking.
Very nice project. Congrats!
It is not necessary to be original, when you can be good, as Mies once said. The laborious search of the originality, it`s killing architecture. Crazy by the form.
Every time I see a post about a white project in Portugal, there’s the inevitable, immature comment “Siza wannabe”. And, if it’s a project from Siza himself, “Siza self-reference again”… Say, if it was painted in pale pink or baby blue, what would happen? If the very same building, with the very same superb detailing, was, let’s say, in southern France, or in Israel, it wouldn’t be anymore a “Siza copycat”, for sure. Besides, this would be a copy of what? of which project? Is “detailed white” the trademark here? Actually, this particular project would relate more to the work of Souto de Moura rather than to Siza’s… But then again, why not to Pawson? Campo Baeza? Caruso St. John? perhaps Steven Holl’s early white boxes? As for the un-innovative use of materials… innovation for the sake of innovation responds to nothing but the vogue. Worrying about being (and staying) original, rather than with the quality of things created, is the concern of those with very little to say.
@andre
“if u think good architecture is doing something that nobody has ever done i’m sorry too tell u but that doesn’t happen”
did I say that? no.
“but nobody is trying to copy them blindly”
oh, really?
“if u dont’ understand what integration means i’ll explain it to you. imagine a old mediterranean lady going to a little village’s cemetery, and when she arrives she bangs her head against a high tech, full of steel and polymers derivated materials. and this doesn’t have to be an old lady. do you think she would be confortable in such a place? a place that’s built for meditating and moaning?”
is this a joke? it gotta be.
“do you get now why he uses brick in holland and granit in santiago??”
fyi: he used bricks in holland ’cause he had to. it was mandatory! and santiago’s museum is one of the few exceptions.
@Rick
Say, if it was painted in pale pink or baby blue, what would happen?
that would never happen. all they see is white&white.
“But then again, why not to Pawson? Campo Baeza? Caruso St. John? perhaps Steven Holl’s early white boxes?”
they might have heard the names a couple ou times at faup, but they most surely have no idea of who pawson or caruso st john are. sad but true for most of the copycats.
—
I just don’t get why AD keeps posting the mediocre copycats and not the ones that actually do it well. ’cause there are a few…
@Chris
Could you give us an example of who “actually do it well”?
nice going chris! brilliant and well founded arguments!! just keep it up will ya… oh and no, it wasn’t a joke…
@Nico Saieh
nuno brandao costa is a souto de moura copycat who actually does it well.
@andre
now that you’ve run out of arguments ’cause I’ve debunked them all, you start behaving like a 4 year old…
alright, bye.
@andre
but that ‘old mediterranean lady going to a little village’s cemetery’ story was quite funny. I gotta give you that..
so i’m the one out of arguments… and i thought i was the funny one. i think u should talk to nuno brandao costa and ask him how well he copies souto de moura, and pay atention to his answer…
Original, tradition, etc.
http://estoa.blogspot.com/2009/05/creativos-i-la-originalidad-y-la-forma.html
yeah, I think I’m gonna stop by his office monday morning.
I’ll tell him you say hi!
I don’t know if it is a Siza or Souto do Moura copy… but I really like the project… it is very simple and elegant.
By the way, I also loved the other Pedro Pacheco + Marie Clément that was posted in this page a few weeks ago.
Continue with the good works Pedro Pacheco + Marie Clément.
For the record I’m not portuguese, neither an architect.
Chris, shut up. You’ve probably never built anything and therefore come up with these arb comments. Try being complimentary instead of jealous.
I dont’ necessarily agree with everything Chris said but there are lots of Siza/Koolhass/Herzog wannabes out there and wether they are copycats – what a funny word – or not, this is not a good project. 5/10, I would say.
*Sorry about my bad english.
well the funniest and most paradoxal thing about all this is that it managed to be so controversial, contrary to what generally happens in Portuguese architecture and with portuguese architects desire for peace and serenety. So much noise over such quiet object…Seems obvious to me that it’s not a masterpiece though very well executed but then again…there’s was no reason for cutting edge masterpiece in midle of alentejo,this seems perfectly apropriate to portuguese culture of death.
i don’t think the problem was the project on it own. the problem is that there are people that cannot see anything beside of what they know, and don’t have the sensitivity to understand buildings and their permisis.i guess opinions and tastes are hard to change. putting that apart, i completely agree with opium, in everything he said. it’s not a masterpiece and it’s not supose to be.
@chris i still hope u can see pass the similarity’s and start noticing the unique aspects of the project, since i haven’t read anything about the project i can’t evaluate u’r understanding of the matter therefore my atempts to “wake u up”. never had the intention of insulting anybody.
Is a very beautiful building but ther is not place for thinking. Feels really uncomfortable be there trying to concicliate feelings and space. I dont´t like it.
@opium
who said anything about a cutting edge masterpiece? all I said was that this was a failed attempt to copy siza’s style! and it is, in fact, a bad copy. plain and simple!
@andre
‘unique aspects of the project’? that’s my whole point! there’s absolutely nothing! unique about this project. it’s a copy/paste/copy/paste endless sequence…
you didn’t insult anybody and neither did I, but this is going nowhere, so this is it for me.
Chris you really know nothing about architecture…
I have no idea why ArchDaily keeps posting this s****! As a portuguese architect I’m ashamed to see this kind of projects here! This is definitely not a good project! I just wouldn’t call Nuno Brandão Costa a Souto de Moura copycat, but I completely agree with Chris on everything else!
I’m completly agree with Ruy Dias, this is a very common project, no innovation, not a creative exemple to be shown, we must see a good creation, out of common things, do a serious choice, before publish.
I agree with Chris, this is indeed a bad project. But everyone is entitled to their own opinion, so i respect both sides as long as long as they show some respect.
PS – If I owned this place I’d show no mercy and ban roadkill for his first comment.
I like the project…
BUT¡¡!!…. it is true that many people cover themselves on the excuse of architectural traditions or “schools“ to avoid innovation. As patrick schumacher said, architects should be radical innovators… WHO IS evolving the fundaments of the school of oporto? even siza evolves with his projects. It can be compared to mexican architecture and the many thousands of copycats and barragan´s wannabes, the same legorreta has evolve very little his work…. so, don´t get offended… but the school of oporto was some time ago, and there are many bad copycats.
@ andre, please, that story about the lady has to be a joke!!! HAS TO BE!! completely absurd!!
muito bom.
I think i got it…
Chris went to FAUP in Erasmus Program and flunked!!! Now he’s angry with Portuguese architecture and architects because they don’t understood his originality when he was a student for a year in Oporto…
Architecture has to, above all, express and offer quality, in terms of function, space, and esthetic. If besides all of this it’s original, well, better for everyone. Architecture is not a catwalk in Paris, where everybody has to suprise for it’s oustandig originality. Innovation it’s not form, material, image. It’s aproach, concept and emotion.
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