Stational architecture on the way to Vila Viçosa: the new pedestrian and cycling lane of the estremoz anticline

The project concerns a process of territorial and landscape re-evaluation in Portugal, in the region of Central Alentejo, in particular on the Estremoz Anticline, involving the towns of Estremoz, Borba and Vila Viçosa.
Due to a situation of abandonment of the quarries and the decline of the field of the marble extraction, today, the landscape is characterized by a wide presence of inactive industries coexisting with the colourful panorama of the agricultural landscape. In the last decade the municipalities have tried to
re-enhance these spaces to the population with theatre and music events.
Starting from these considerations we have designed a strategy for the Anticlinal de Estremoz.

The designed  pedestrian and cycling path is a spatial tool capable of rediscover the rural, mining and urban landscape of the villages. In the second planning phase we focused on Vila Viçosa, a small town in the region. The project we propose is a museum- theatre in the quarry of Gradinha, which is set in an area that represents the synthesis of historical and natural features of this landscape.
The building has been conceived as a ramp-shaped linking element that creates spaces like the museum and the theatre.

With this project we intend to reconnect the landscape of the Estremoz Anticline by reactivating and implementing elements that could boost the tourism economy on a territorial scale and reconnect the disrupted units of the landscape through the museum-theatre, also seeing the project as a potencial example of architecture reproducible in other quarries of the Alentejo.