Hotel in Covilhã

The main challenges of the project are the use of the remaining building, the necessary excavation and the insertion of the needed infrastructures to maintain the existing openings. The building procedure consists in cutting the slab in rectangles and fitting metallic beams in those holes so that the rest can be demolished. The slabs are generally mixed.

The first question was whether we should keep the sanatorium atmosphere and its lining materials. We thought so, because they were a
good image of an environment of the 30s, with the advantage that today the materials existing there could still be found. Thus, the proposal
was a “full restoration”, except for the redesign of the roofs. It was intended to meet the real needs for the implementation of an hotel
equipment making it profitable, efficient and functional, without changing the adopted concept of a “global restoration”, where the adaptation to its new function was almost “natural” and which, altogether, had the coherent and final image of a reconstructed building.

Eduardo Souto de Moura