Architects: 100 Planos Arquitectura
Location: Póvoa de Varzim, Portugal
Client: The Portuguese Heath Ministry
Engineering: ASL&Associados L.da
Contractor: MonteAdriano SGPS
Design Year: 2004-2007
Construction Year: 2007-2008
Photographer: Pedro Serapicos
“The hospital was a hospital like any other in a big city. It had a sinister look, bleak, repulsive, of things that are done by necessity, an obligation … Inside didn’t fit the generous impulse of the heart, but the technique, science, the regulation.”
Domingos Monteiro – Tales and Drama, Vol, 1943
The text above was the starting point of this project.
We were asked to build a pediatric wing on a very damaged XIX century hospital.
The idea was to create a building that didn’t look like a hospital, where children and adults feld as if they were at home. An emotional, simple and non clinic, yet efficient space, were blue a white domain, under the doctors colorful closes.
The interior space is organized by tow parallel corridors perforated by skylights, that bring the Atlantic sun inside, and create constant changes on the interior.
The exterior tries to resolve the volumetric relations with the preexisting building, creating a big frame, that holds a playful metal white facade.
The rest just happens in a very free way, just expecting people feel a little bit better, inside…
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- floor plan
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- east elevation
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- north elevation
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- west elevation
Buildings whose main idea is to not do something, rather than to do something, usually end up like this one, unclear and cluttered.
Ah! The building is placed in Póvoa de Varzim,not Vila do Conde. But not the point. There was a rumour going that the contractor had donated the new wing.
And inside,is not funtional and well structured at all.. But I mean,It’s a hospital in Portugal,what can you expect..
Well, I have to say that I already been there (taking a friend who had this stupid kart accident) and in terms of functionality this hospital sins a lot. Just look at the access ramp. It’s way too small for even an ambulance to maneuver well, now imagine if two ambulances reach at once…
Anyway, I (and notice, I am no architect, just a civil engineer student who loves to watch to a beautiful building) think that we should praise the Portuguese health ministry for this concession. Most of the hospitals in Portugal are so stale that it hurts.