Lux Garden is a set of 8 buildings integrated in the Lejana de Baixo development in Faro, Algarve, Portugal, having been developed with the aim of becoming a reference in the city's new housing area. The building’s implantation and volumetry were defined by the allotment plan, in a U-shape around a yard and developing in 6 and 7 floors above ground and 2 floors below ground for parking.
The group is unitary and faces its interior, like a “courtyard house” on a larger scale. The entrance is located at the axis of the open top and the distribution for each of the buildings done through the garden in the yard. This semi-public space for exclusive use by residents, allows for a multiplicity of interactions and uses, offering different valences at an individual or group level, not only for those who extend their living to the outside, but also for those who, from the balconies of their houses, observe the landscape throughout the day and seasons.
The volumes are more enclosed on the exterior, with opaque and zigged concrete balconies, allowing a play of light and shades during the day, giving a dynamism that simultaneously demasses the facade, controls sunlight and hides the service areas (drying areas, air conditioning units and barbecues). On the interior, permeability and visual extension are guaranteed through metal railings.
The buildings develop on a base, formed by the ground floor and the uncovered basement (due to the street's slope), in a dark colored plaster that goes up on the face of the vertical accesses through the remaining floors. This base frames the windows of the apartments at ground floor.
The areas on the remaining floors are glazed, allowing for a direct connection between the interior of the rooms and the exterior in long balconies.
On the roof are located private terraces with access from the interior of the apartments and a the technical terrace of the building.
The landscaping is based on the dichotomy between the natural landscape of the marshes and the built landscape of Ria Formosa’s saltpans and appropriates the design of these two references of the local built and natural heritage and applies them to the yard in a free way, as a pre-existence and that the construction had been later “juxtaposed” to the place.
Presents a fluid design in the circulation/plantation zones (marsh, curved shapes) with endemic species, a common usufruct orchard, multipurpose lawn areas, recreational areas dedicated to reading, physical exercise and children's playground in opposition to the “humanized” area with altered natural characteristics (saltpans, orthogonal shapes) where the swimming pool is located, with the pavement of the solarium area in custom-made concrete blocks with stereotomy alluding to the saltpans, and the entrance portico in wooden slats.
