Modern Architecture: Portuguese Hotel with Green Design

Take a look at a great example of how to mix nature and modern architecture, here in Design Contract. Miguel Correia’s studio Future Architecture Thinking – whose past projects include an angular red arts and culture centre – designed the Sobreiras Alentejo Country Hotel for a site near the village of Grândola, about an hour’s drive from Lisbon.

The 25-hectare estate boasts gentle hills, meadows and forests of cork oak trees.

The project team wanted to make the visitors experience the landscape of the Serra de Grândola unforgetable, by retaining the natural characteristics of the site, and by complementing these with forms and materials familiar to the region.

The hotel’s 22 rooms and two suites are housed in the remaining five blocks, which each contain four or five units with individual balconies.

The amazing hotel comprises eight buildings scattered among the existing trees, as it is positioned on the crest of a hill with panoramic views to the east.

An infinity pool rise out towards the horizon on the eastern side of the building, where landscaping is kept to a minimum to emphazise, the hotel’s proximity to nature.

Each of the buildings features a row of gabled volumes, with strong white surfaces accentuating their minimal forms. Wooden frameworks incorporated into the east-facing elevations introduce a rustic detail that embrace the nearby amazing trees.