ArchiTourAlgarve - Walking Tour Portimão - (Modernist) Architecture, Art & More

ArchiTourAlgarve - Walking Tour Portimão - (Modernist) Architecture, Art & More

A walking Tour in Portimão with (Modernist) Architecture, Art & More

The modernist architecture part in Portimão consists largely of the architecture of António Vicente de Castro. He was born in Lisbon on October 17, 1920 and died on November 26, 2002, also in Lisbon. He started his academic career in Lisbon, but soon moved to the School of Visual Arts in Porto, where he completed his studies in 1955. In 1956 he moves back to the Algarve, having spent much of his youth in Lagos. He opens his architectural firm in Portimão, where he begins his professional career and where he will realize approximately 120 projects.

He does research and worked with themes such as collective and single-family homes, facilities, services and urban planning. Between 1975 and 1976 he worked for the Municipality of Portimão, where he participates in urban planning and urban renewal projects. In his projects, especially the integration with their environment is visible: in the green spaces and the orientation to the sun. They are buildings with simple geometric shapes as usual in modernism and built of concrete, steel and glass.

He was - together with the architects Manuel Gomes da Costa and Manuel Laginha - one of the three pioneers who introduced "Modernism" in the Algarve. They were all trained in Porto by professor Carlos Ramos and brought the post-war “Modern Architecture of the International Movement” to the Algarve.
We can associate Vicente de Castro with Portimão, Gomes da Costa with Faro and Laginha with Loulé.