Busy like monday morning

Monday – busy as it is written in “life rules” book. We had a major decision making meeting with two of our engineers Rita and Daniel and prof. Teresa Fonseca. And it was decided that changes according to many different things need to be done.

 
Here are the previous and the new submission drawings with most of the changes included:
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In order to involve new solutions in our design, Wednesday morning we had an introduction to the hydroponic gardening system. This means possibility of growing plants without soil or sunlight. All you need is water and artificial light to grow, let’s say parsley for your soup. Amazing!

We are still thinking if it is possible to have this invention in our project, but yet it is a good information to have in future.

big scale example of hydroponic garden system

Thursday escaping afternoon work we met Alvaro Leite Siza Vieira– Siza Junior, visiting his Fez House. Amazingly for such name in architecture, he was very welcoming and willing to spend two and a half hours showing us his piece of art – house in every detail!

We have to thank Marta tough, since she was the main link to this great experience and wonderful architecture.

visit captions

 

Day after, DIMSCALE, trough skype conference came up with not very pleasant information, that all companies which are our possible material suppliers are on vacation for one month. So till than is not possible to have the exact material information, but it also means possibility to think more thrill into the details and providing new solutions in terms of materials and implementation. And the idea is to have as much possibilities as we can, in a way to be more efficient when we will get the final information about the suppliers.

With busy week ahead, meaning submission of the technical drawings, off we go!

as we continue

Great apologies to all of you for being late with this post, but we wanted to do some work so that we can show to all of you. And this will be one very loooong post :)

 After few weeks in Porto area, we are officially not considered as tourists. And by being privileged with this –no tourist- title we receive more responsibility, gratis!

Starting with the meeting on Tuesday 26^th June with the acknowledged professor Teresa Fonseca, few subjects were discussed, including the space organization in service area and positioning the stairs in order to provide spaces with greater value. 

Since in this stage we are focusing on details, we made a survey of all the woodwork that is in our possession. This type of catalog will help us to get to know the amount of wood that is possible to re/use. For now the entrance facade doors are the only one s to be saved as they are, with small refurbishment actions. But this doesn’t mean that if the wood cannot maintain its primary function that will be just thrown away. The idea is to reuse as much as possible in any possible function. For now there are some ideas floating around, but we would love to hear yours. Please fill up the comment box with any idea, link, critique or anything related to the project. It will be great to start discussing these things with you.

Here is the survey:

After the meeting with the interior designer Caroline Cuvilier on 28^th of June, we decided that few changes according to CABA should be made. First the positioning. Since the entrances to the 1^st and 2^nd apartment are positioned on different side, the space that is provided has different qualities. So the change is reflecting only to the 2^nd floor, where the CABA is flipped on north-south axe, so that the position of the pipes is not changed, and the space in front of the kitchen is bigger. 

Another important task we had was to actually materialize/specify the drawings /plans/sections/details. All of this work was the preparation for Skype conference with Dimscale, which we had in the following (our third) week. In the meantime, we had our regular 

Tuesday night meeting with Arrebita architects + engineers that were helping us to solve some issues (roof, ventilation, sewage pipes, communications..).

On Wednesday we met LogAcustica, the company that was helping us to solve the issues regarding the acoustic insulation. Some of the things we learned was that main insulation layer should be placed between different functions, in our case that would be between apartments and commercial zone. We talked about different needs, and thus kinds of insulation we could use, some specific solutions for the CABA, and they recommended some providers… Altogether, some very useful info!

Finally on Thursday the 5^th we had online meeting with Dimscale, and we discussed our needs for materials, possible prices and so on. However, we sent them a list with all possible materials we could think of for our building (from nail to concrete) so they could help us in the search for suppliers.

And then came the weekend! It was the time for Arrebita! trip! Ze took some of us (that deserved it J) to his grandparents village near Tua, where all magic about Porto vine happens! It was perfect timing to wonder around, visit farm-in-cave, pick some tasty oranges and cherries, drink Porto vine and climb very dangerous hill in order to see some prehistoric paintings! But that’s the spirit of Arrebitas! Overall, it was a very nice weekend, and special thanks goes to Ze, his mom and grandparents for being the perfect hosts

happy familly

Monday again, back on track, we had a workshop with Porto Vivo, and learned about rehabilitation strategies and projects around Porto. They gave us a tour around our neighborhood to show us on site what was and is to be done. Amazing walk and amazing projects!

Porto Vivo presentation

visiting the ongoing projects of Porto Vivo

The rest of the time we mostly dedicated to the 4^th Open Working Day. On Tuesday we had a meeting with professora Teresa and in the evening we met some Arrebita! architects. Altogether, a few sleepless nights, and the presentation was finally made! The Open Working Day was a new experience for most of us, and we were quite satisfied how it went. We presented our work to our partners and the people we’re working with, and got some useful feedback on how to continue.

discussion after presentation

  Here is our presentation, please feel free to comment and add suggestions (positive and negative are all welcome!

 

 

 

 

  
However, that Wednesday was a full-schedule day, since later in the afternoon we had a workshop with IQ Energy. Nuno Rolo gave us some good ideas on how to maintain the energy within the building as much as we can. In the early evening we were preparing some delicious tiramisu for the dinner with our dear professora Teresa. We made a short trip to her lovely home in Matosinhos. It was a perfect ending to a busy day, thank you professora! 

pleasure is all ours

The end of the week was dedicated to sorting out all of the information we got so far. We met magna-natura, cork company that would provide this material for us. We learned about new interesting ways to implement cork in interior design, and we’ll try to find its place in our project. On Friday we had a short trip to Cobert factory in Torres Vedras, and we learned about the production of tiles, and were quite amazed with it! In the end it was a very successful visit, since we established the partnership with the company, as they would provide us the finest quality tiles for our roof! 

detailed tour of the factory

And this is just the beginning!

Jornal Público is following our work and here is the report that we were impatient to see :)