© FG+SG – Fernando Guerra, Sergio Guerra

Architects: Contemporânea / Manuel Graça Dias + Egas José Vieira
Location: Chaves, Portugal
Coordination: Luís Torgal, Architect
Collaborators: Duarte Correia, Amílcar Duarte, Mihai Varzan, Sara Baptista, Marta Quinaz, Sofia Sanches, Sara Rodrigues, Architects
Client: Câmara Municipal de Chaves (Chaves City Council)
Models: José António Aires Pereira
Project Year: 2004-2008
Photography: FG+SG – Fernando Guerra, Sergio Guerra

We developed the school as a long strip aligned with former railway station building, inflecting it slightly, in the middle, towards the north, to meet the locomotive repair workshop we intended for the bar/restaurant of the whole.

situation plan

At this point of change in direction, that coincides with the entrance to the school atrium, was inserted, almost in the perpendicular, the auditorium, crossing the site. Taking advantage of the incline of the amphitheatre – which will descend, from the first floor towards the ground -, a generous half arch was created that, simultaneously marks, covers and protects the entrance, permitting the visual continuity of the volumetric progression of the building.

© FG+SG – Fernando Guerra, Sergio Guerra

This axis, deep and complex, continues the alignment begun by the recent recuperation of the former station and goods platform that dramatized the space between the aforementioned pieces: the arch under the auditorium contributing to the continuation of a “metaphysical” atmosphere that the other arches – those of the station —, formerly announced.

© FG+SG – Fernando Guerra, Sergio Guerra

The exterior arrangement will explore the sense of a “street” with the creation of stone pavements and with the painting of concrete walls, in dark red, so as to reinforce the longilinear dimension of the place.

The south windows will be apertures in a “bar code” sequence, filling the corridors with striped lighting.

© FG+SG – Fernando Guerra, Sergio Guerra

At the west end there will be two metallic pavilions, with the same section of an existing stone building that housed the Historical Archives. They are “carriages”, slightly disordered, that will house a future Railway Museum.