To culminate the 2023 program calendar, Casa do Design proudly unveils a retrospective dedicated to the architect Luís Pádua Ramos, whose most representative works express the search for a symbolic and semantic dimension in architecture.
The retrospective is dedicated to the architect Luís Pádua Ramos (1931-2005), whose most representative works express the search for a symbolic and semantic dimension in architecture, influenced by Art Nouveau, Art Deco and Pop Art, but also by the radical and postmodern movements that were sweeping through Europe and the United States in those years: from the Archigram group to the Superstudio and Archizoom groups, from the Memphis group to Michael Graves and James Stirling, Robert Venturi and Charles Moore.
Luís Pádua Ramos began his professional career in 1955 as a collaborator in the design studio of José Carlos Loureiro. In 1960 he became his partner and founded GALP - Gabinete de Arquitectura, Urbanismo e Engenharia, Lda. This collaboration resulted in numerous projects. The most paradigmatic examples are the Hotel D. Henrique (1966) and the Campo do Luso residential complex (1962) in Porto. The partnership with the architect José Carlos Loureiro and the strong influence of the Modern Movement, which was already maturing in Portugal, provided a fertile ground for experimentation for the young Luís Pádua Ramos, who, from the very first projects that were entirely his own - such as the two houses for his family and parents on Estrada da Circunvalação, in Porto (1960), and the house in Fão (1960) - showed a peculiar ability to look beyond the absolute, static and unchanging ideal of the Modern Movement.
