Revitalizing Lisbon’s Rua da Junqueira, this renovation project, House Altinho by António Costa Lima Arquitectos, transforms a historic warehouse into a stunning home. Open and sunny interiors offer three verandas designed with a new steel structure and spacious living spaces across three floors. Text description provided by the architects. The site is called Altinho probably because it’s on a higher level than the old Junqueira Street which is mostly in a lower plan. From the little square, you can get a privileged view over the river and the Electricity Museum, one indelible icon of the city history.
The original use of the building is related to the fluvial nature of the city. It is integrated into the wide waste of manufacturing and logistic warehouses that spreads and swarm in an irregular line along the Tagus banks in streets like Junqueira, Pedrouços, Dom Luis I, Rua da Alfândega, Rua of the Tobacco Garden, Calçada de la Cruz de Pedra, Xabregas, etc. The option of maintaining the original walled perimeter rests on the interpretation of the intrinsic value of this morphology in the context of Junqueira and the city.
The house is born of the confrontation of two archetypes – house vs. warehouse – confronting shapes, scales, and materials. Thus, the house occupies the walled perimeter interspersing patios and terrace voids with fragmented volumes.
