• public housing
• open space
• place making
• infrastructure

After the 1974 revolution (ending the period of Estado Novo dictatorship in force since 1933), the SAAL program [Serviço de Apoio Ambulatório Local] was established, starting the movement for social housing in Portugal. The government of Evora became a part of this effort in integrating peripheral areas and providing low-income housing. A vast area of 27 hectares of rugged terrain in the outskirts of Evora – a Roman city with 30,000 inhabitants located 140km East of Lisbon - has become part of a residential neighborhood project for the Residents' Association. Although there was already a plan for the area in the late 1960s before Siza's project, the design of high-rise buildings was incompatible with the city's scale. In this period, Evora's municipal government defined a plan to create social housing in old rural properties named Quintas. In 1977, the Secretary of State for Housing and Urbanism, Nuno Portas, commissioned the project's first phase to Architect Alvaro Siza as a housing cooperative and later as housing units. The boundaries of Bairro da Malagueira were defined by a radial road connecting to the city (east-west axis) and a river in the existing neighborhoods of Santa Maria and Nossa Senhora da Gloria on the west of the medieval city walls. The project considered the urban grid of the Santa Maria neighborhood and proposed fragments with a new pattern of orthogonal streets to accommodate new housing at different angles. The spaces at the intersection of these grids with the existing streets became communal spaces with stores, parking, pedestrian circulation, and leisure areas. The individual housing units consisted of 2-floor buildings, one to five bedrooms, and a small private patio, totaling 1200 new houses organized in Villas with semi-detached houses along 100 meters of extension and connected by quiet residential streets. Two typologies of L-shaped houses were proposed with patios in front or at the back of the 8x12 meters lots. Each home is unique due to the composition of the number of bedrooms - adaptative to the family's needs - personalized patio, and how it is implanted in the topography. The second-level patios are an innovative solution allowing residents to experience street life in a more personal way. The National Housing System (SNF) – linked to the Public Works Ministry - was responsible for transferring financial resources for the construction. Although the project faced challenges in the uncertainty of institutional support and an undercapitalized economy, 1100 units were built by July 1997. From these units, 660 units were executed by cooperatives, 385 units resulted from public investment, and 55 units were constructed by private investment. The Giralda and Boa Vontade cooperatives are currently responsible for building the project's remaining 100 residential units and unfinished public amenities. The period for the owner to finance the construction through cooperatives is 25 years. Cooperatives are non-profit associations that help control market prices and speculation in the sale of properties. New infrastructure and urban facilities such as water and electricity supply were provided by a centralized major structure - a two-story masonry structure recalling the symbology of the existing historic aqueduct. This structure consolidated civic life in the project and created legibility. Aqueducts were lower in cost and contributed to making landmarks in the region and establishing entrances to the neighborhood's public facilities. Formally, the structures also break the repetition created by the white wall housing units. In addition, the landscape project created a pond at a lower topographic level and gardens with fountains to keep humidity levels during the summer. The particularities of the Quinta da Malagueira characterize the project as a model for urban interventions that envision affordable housing provision while respectfully operating in a historical context. More than a Housing project, the Malagueira quarter aimed at becoming a community through the ownership of a cooperative of residents instead of a typical government-subsidized social housing.