This project is a coexistence of opposites. And for that, a success. The key is, naturally, in coexistence. It is given twice. On the one hand, to adapt to the master plan of Lisbon’s urban planning, the property is divided into two volumes and, despite this, it functions with a single identity. To achieve this, the architects folded the public space with a slope, which marks the continuity of the urban fabric from the hill to the river, and connected the buildings at the highest point of that fold.
The second coexistence of opposites occurs between two concepts: sustainability and identity. In a time when the first word seems to have its own image, the Chilean studio’s solution to this conflict is, pardon the bad joke, elementary. Here sustainability is not seen, but it is felt when inside the building the sun not only does not bother, but is appreciated; when the staircase is prioritized because it is in the foreground, illuminated and not hidden as a secondary access; when the lamps only turn on at night; when one can go out to the terrace to talk or work using natural energy (solar) and when the thermal mass of the concrete building acts as a filter for cold and heat and also serves to build an urban landmark.
This headquarters is a building with character, a unique space that is solid, civic, unexpected and, however, attentive to its place and time. The best buildings of the 21st century speak from that vocation of service.
Thus, the rotundity of the headquarters, reminiscent of a falla or a large concrete sculpture, is domesticated on the side facades, with recessed glass and brise-soleil that prevent direct radiation (the greenhouse effect). It also gains human scale there by offering civic life for which the new urban plaza, the public space between the two parts of the headquarters, which is a plaza, serves as the stage. To underline this decision, the entrance to the headquarters is not through the square, but through one of the side streets.
In Elemental they talk about humanistic functionalism. Take care of what is inside as much as what is outside. They defend a quality of life that improves work. And in this building there is always light and the sun enters without dazzling. To connect the headquarters with the city, they have opened a cafe on the ground floor. To improve the lives of employees, they installed a gym on the roof.
Elemental takes the lead when it comes to building buildings in which sustainability is as forceful as it is invisible. It is not about announcing it as a merit of one’s own, or of the building, it is about embodying it. With that idea, and in Lisbon, they have built the headquarters of Energía de Portugal, a building that is an urban block. An office headquarters that speaks of business and responsibility, that displays attentive architecture and that is a model of a civic, domesticated and sustainable workspace.