An architecture of deliberate disruption

The project begins with a close reading of the existing building as a layered and unresolved condition rather than a neutral container. Instead of correcting or concealing its irregularities, the intervention accepts them as a starting point. The aim is not to replace the existing spatial order but to inhabit it differently, allowing structure, circulation, and material transitions to remain visible and open to interpretation.

A new structure is inserted on its own terms. Slender metal poles support a continuous I beam running from front to back, establishing a clear structural line within the interior. Where constraints arise, the beam is interrupted. These cuts are left exposed and emphasized, transforming technical adjustments into architectural moments. Painted in vivid red and blue, the new elements deliberately disrupt circulation, blocking doors, windows, and passages. Through this controlled inconvenience, the structure asserts its presence and becomes an active agent within the space.

Elsewhere, intervention is kept deliberately restrained. Inside, demolition is minimal, limited to the addition of a few strategic walls that subtly recalibrate spatial relationships. Towards the street, the building acquires a reflective upper layer that alters its urban presence. At the rear, a translucent envelope improves insulation while forming enclosed balconies on each level. This added skin operates as both climate device and visual filter, composed of glass, yellow frames, mirrored strips, and marble.

Throughout the project, architecture is constructed through an insistence on lines and surfaces applied systematically but pushed toward excess. Wooden skirting lines, yellow frames, and dense metal mesh redraw the existing spaces, while colour fragments each room into planes of white, light green, and dark blue. Mirrors appear where edges refuse to align, allowing imperfections to multiply into reflective surfaces. The result is a dense and layered interior in which every fragment follows the same logic, offering a new reading of the existing building through disruption, repetition, and visibility.

Project Credit

Project name: fala 171 – house of remarks
Location: Porto, Portugal
Time: 2022 – 2024  
Design team: fala
Photo: Francisco Ascensão / @francisco.ascensao
Area: 245m2 (site); 380m2 (building)

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