Arquitectura (in)sustentável - case study: os Edifícios da Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian

Abstract

This Master's dissertation is entitled (un)Sustainable Architecture : the Buildings of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation. In the first chapter, (Un) Sustainability: Background of the modern movement in architecture I shall speak about the "sustainable" aspects of architecture in the modern movement that emerges during the first decades of the twentieth century. "Sustainable" comes from the Latin word "sustinere" which means "keep alive", "defend". In the modern movement the word sustainability was not yet applied in the "architectural" sense. Only in 1972 it was defined, within the economic scope, as a concept of "restoring the resources used up by the organizations". However, I will try to show that the architecture of the modern movement already revealed concerns of sustainability, particularly in the integration of the buildings into the landscape, climate, geographical area and even in the choice of the building materials. In the second chapter, entitled light, clime and architecture, the methodology will consist in understanding the architectural concepts related to climate, namely with the sun-seeking system in buildings, the temperature and moisture concentration in air, and their location and building materials. In the third chapter, entitled Geography of a Space: The Calouste Gulbenkian Park, I will describe aspects related to the geography of the area where the buildings of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation were constructed, and which stand as the case study of this dissertation. In the fourth chapter - Case study: the buildings of the Calouste Gulbekian Foundation - I will focus on the case study of this dissertation. I will begin by defining the buildings of the Headquarters, Museum and Modern Art Centre of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, describing their integration in the existing gardens, the intervention strategy and the facilities programme. I will also present biographical data on the architects involved in the design construction of the buildings as well as their most relevant works. I will also refer to the architectural overview of the time when these buildings were designed, in order to explain the architectural context of the work. I will also refer to the aspects of contextualization and sustainability of the buildings and the garden.