Amidst the revitalization dynamics of Porto's downtown, the D. João IV project was aimed at the refurbishment of a 19th century bourgeois house in ruins, and its conversion into a multifamily housing complex through four 1-bedroom and 2-bedroom apartments.

The proposal is understood as a pragmatic response to the program requirements where the preexisting is a guide in the dialogue between two different temporal spaces: past and present. It is based on a simple principle: re-inhabit respecting the character and the concept of the building.

The project maintains the distinguishing quality of the elements in preexistence, of the structural and constructive system, as well as of the spatial layout, circumscribing itself in introducing the necessary infrastructures for the new experience, such as kitchens and bathrooms.

It was intended that our action in the building would be done by diluting all the interventions that it already had had, clearly abandoning the pretension of an authorial affirmation through design.

D. João IV House was born 120 years ago and we hope that it will be lived in for 120 years more…