The Municipality of Manteigas and the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Porto (FAUP), through an institutional partnership dedicated to mutual development in the fields of research and action, recognise the importance of disciplinary thought and intervention in the territories of Portugal’s interior that are undergoing processes of loss. The need to identify strategies and seek solutions that contribute to consistent development, based on the specific characteristics and values of these territories, while reinforcing their identity and promoting positive dynamics of urban transformation, constitutes the central point of the relationship between academia and the municipality.
Through the Project 5 curricular unit of the Integrated Master’s Degree in Architecture, a group of 60 final-year FAUP students developed, throughout the 2024/2025 academic year, urban intervention strategies and public space projects aimed at enhancing the transformative capacity of the village of Manteigas. The proposals focus on the requalification, regeneration and refunctionalisation of the village, while also exploring interventions located in other areas of the territory surrounding the glacial valley.
Under the motto The Village of Manteigas and the Challenges of Interior Territories: Promoting Identity and Renewing the Imaginary in the ‘Heart’ of Serra da Estrela, the students’ studies were guided by the teaching team of FAUP’s Project 5 curricular unit — composed of Teresa Calix, Luís Pedro Silva and Mário Mesquita — and were supported by the Municipality of Manteigas, through the Mayor, Flávio Massano, and several municipal technicians.
From the perspective of architectural education, the proposed challenge also sought to bring students closer to the professional practice of the architect, providing them with a real working experience on a concrete territory and in direct relation with decision-makers and agents of territorial and urban transformation.
Based on an approach grounded in the reading of the diversity of current and future challenges affecting urban space, the work recognised signs of disorder and degradation within the urban core, while also addressing the natural spaces and resources that characterise the surrounding landscape. These natural resources correspond, on the one hand, to an environmental dimension of great value, strongly responsible for the mobilisation of the tourism sector. On the other hand, they are resources that must be preserved and present a highly significant vulnerability associated with high or very high wildfire risk. The relationship between the village and the river was also considered, as well as the urban occupation along the glacial valley, in order to understand principles of planning and reconversion for some existing constructions, contributing to the establishment of new references for urban qualification.
The methodological approach is based on group work, materialised through collective proposals, while also promoting an individual critical position integrated within a collective, collaborative purpose committed to negotiating the best solution for each case study.
The proposals began with the recognition of the existing reality, systematised through elements of urban characterisation, and led to the definition of a project intervention strategy. This strategy represents the principles of a functional, urban and environmental restructuring of the study area. Consequently, Operational Units and Intervention Zones were defined, establishing the programmatic conditions that guide the areas considered priorities and informing design decisions centred on the qualification of the public space system.
The FAUP_P5_MTG_25 exhibition presents a selection of the material produced by the students throughout the year. It seeks to make visible the method and the process of successive approximation towards more detailed urban scales, without losing the overall vision.
Although it corresponds to a partial selection, the exhibition allows for the reading of some of the visions developed. This exercise aims to contribute to the activation of several reflections based on the proposals presented and, above all, to open new paths for new and different proposals within the context and development of a municipal strategy. The exploration of possibilities from within academia is grounded in a robust and activating vision of the economic, social and cultural territory of the village of Manteigas, positioning it as a fundamental decision-making system capable of sustaining the place and its community.
Teresa Calix
Associate Professor at the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Porto
Course Director of the Project 5 Curricular Unit