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Camélia Hotel Sénior & Homes

This is a project by NAAA Associated Architects and it is located at Guimarães, Portugal. Project's program: Restaurant, bar, library, living, gymnasium, swimming pool, bedrooms, garage, service, technical and staff areas. There are thirteen images for Camélia Hotel Sénior & Homes.

: © Carlos Lobo

Project details

Project name: Camélia Hotel Sénior & Homes
Location: Guimarães, Portugal
Program: Restaurant, bar, library, living, gymnasium, swimming pool, bedrooms, garage, service, technical and staff areas
Area: Project size: 6,200 m2
Year: Completion: 2009
Client: Camélia Hotel Sénior & Homes
Project by: NAAA Associated Architects
Team: Principal Designers: Maria Luís Neiva, Ricardo Bastos Areias
Others: Furniture Design: NAAA Associated Architects • Local Architects: ALCEPI Projectos de Arquitectura e Engenharia • Engineering: ALCEPI Projectos de Arquitectura e Engenharia • Contractor: Eusébios e Filhos

Project images

Designer's statement

Empathy and Mimetic Desire:

An irregular plot where it seemed too tight to fit what we proposed to design, with some existing constructions from the 19th Century we wanted to keep and that strongly had to relate to the new building.

We faced the restrictions of the urban plot as the constraints of a sheet of paper; margins, legibility, vocabulary, narrative, punctuation, as a start point for the project. We decided then to tackle it by arranging the program linearly, and then modeling and adapting it following two steps: a first planimetrical modeling adapting it to the limits of the plot, and then a second altimetrical modeling, in which surfaces were carved from one end of the building to the other.

The program was distributed by the 4 floors following a strict behavior, hierarchical and functional analysis: at the entry level all the common areas, restaurant, bar, library, living, gymnasium and swimming pool, as well as some bedrooms, all living in a perfect symbiosis with the exterior gardens. In the floors above, double and single bedrooms as well as smaller living areas share a greater need for seclusion and privacy. The lower floor encloses the garage, service, technical and staff areas.

The volume is clear but complex, with main emphasis in the skin material of all the façade and roof detaching the building from its surrounding urban context and making it an icon. The decision on which material to use as skin was crucial for the connection with its surroundings to work. Natural copper was specifically selected for its fast inherent chromatic transformation process and durability. Its oxidizing results in a tonal palette (reddish brown, golden, blue, black and eventually green) that varies according to intense rainfall or solar incidence, making this building acquire different tonalities in each surface. Once this never-ending process begins, the building and its surroundings will merge perfectly satisfying a mimetic desire to replicate the place.