The Porto-based Joaquim Portela Arquitetos atelier has been increasingly drawing attention to itself for all the right reasons. Its collection of architectural prizes is steadily growing ever since its inception. Bustling with activity, architect Joaquim Portela’s firm has recently claimed one more Good Design Award for 2021 thanks to the Silo faucet, a project that draws inspiration for its design from the larger concept of the new Portuguese Language Museum. GDN grasped the opportunity to reach out to its founder and CEO to learn more about his career so far, his plans, and the new trends in architecture and design.
I learned from the best and the most curious thing is that they continue to teach, for those who want to learn
GDN: Would you like to tell us how you got into architecture and design? Which are the most influential figures and references for you?
Joaquim Portela: I started to get interested in architecture and design at practically the same time. It was a natural process, which took place whenever I observed a building or a glass, a car, a guardrail on a staircase, the influence that a space or the handling of cutlery had on me. That’s what sparked my curiosity and made me seek to know more and learn. I had the best teachers: Corbusier; Mies; Loos, Alvar Aalto, Marcel Breuer; Walter Gropius; Josef Albers; Dieter Rams; Arne Jacobsen; Hans J. Wegner; Finn Juhl; Børge Mogensen… Yes, it’s the purest truth. I learned from the best and the most curious thing is that they continue to teach, for those who want to learn.
The biggest highlights of my career are the moments when I left my comfort zone and started to be less limited in the creative process
GDN: Where do you draw inspiration from? How about personal fulfillment in your work?
Joaquim: It gives me pleasure to work. I do it naturally. By professional deformation, I began to be much more observant; and that’s the key ingredient to inspiration.
GDN: What do you consider the greatest highlight of your career so far and why? Which were the most important points in this path?
Joaquim: The biggest highlights of my career are not works or things that I drew, but the moments when I left my comfort zone and started to be less limited in the creative process.
GDN: Which moments were these exactly?
Joaquim: This happened to me when I created my own studio, after having worked 15 years in another architecture studio, and it continues to happen frequently. Sometimes we have on our hands a completely sealed project, ready to deliver to the client (after having tried several solutions almost to the limit) and then we decide to start the project from scratch, realizing that at a certain stage of it, we should leave some solutions out, not because they were bad but because we have never tried them before, and they result in less satisfactory outcomes. Then we go back to these solutions and try to learn how to engage with them so that they end up working. Most of the time it forces us to study and learn methods that we had never worked with.
GDN: What is your approach to design challenges? How do you go about finding solutions?
Joaquim: Increasingly, design becomes a broader process. We must have the resources to achieve the solutions we seek in response to the challenges that are proposed to us. These resources are the result of learning without end.
GDN: Would you care to explain that in more detail?
Joaquim: I always seek not to approach projects assuming that I already know what I want as a final solution. It is always a difficult process to quantify in time because it varies a lot from project to project and my premise is always to start from scratch. Depending on the quality of the information provided about the project, ideas begin to emerge naturally and we start to work with a huge set of elements (legal constraints, technical constraints, budget, sustainability, target audience, our client, the program, etc.)
It’s a difficult process, but always very interesting. To this set of ingredients, we always add our experience and the skills of each team member. It’s from this combination that the solution results. Of course, the greater the resources of the work team, the better the solution will be; hence all the members of our team must be curious, travel, read, continue to study, know the world because the creative process feeds on that.
GDN: What is the future of design, not just for yourself and your firm, but in general? Is there one trend to drive things forward or more, and which ones exactly?
Joaquim: At the moment design is already the main factor of success for the biggest companies in the world. The prevalent trend is that this component, combined with sustainability, will become increasingly important, regardless of the product itself. I believe that every company will see its design department grow exponentially in product development.
The “Good Design Award” is a seal of quality. Due to its history, and its prestige, the recognition of this awards program in any work adds value
GDN: You were recently —once more— awarded a 2021 Good Design Award from The Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Architecture and Design and Metropolitan Arts Press Ltd. Would you like to share some details on this project?
Joaquim: We won this award with a faucet we designed for the Portuguese Language Museum project, in Portugal. The building’s main feature was old grain silos, that we turned into a museum. The challenge was to create a line of faucets that were framed in the building’s context and that served the purpose for which it was designed yet could also have application elsewhere.
GDN: Given your repeated success in Good Design Awards over the last years, what do you consider as the defining qualities of “good design”? Based on your experience and the feedback you get, what do people seek in a new concept?
Joaquim: The “Good Design Award” is a seal of quality. Due to its history, and its prestige, the recognition of this awards program in any work adds value. People continue to look at products, for emotions and features that add a better quality of life; this is it, essentially.
GDN: What does that recognition of your work mean to you as a professional? How is the 2021 Good Design Award helping you and the firm move forward?
Joaquim: It is always with great pleasure that we receive recognition for our work. It’s an incentive to keep trying to do better. The ‘Good Design Award’, in addition to being recognized for our work, also adds value.
GDN: After many years in the field and many successful ideas, has anything changed in the way you work?
Joaquim: As time goes by, from year to year, we get older, we grow, and naturally, the way we approach things changes. This is also valid in our profession and the approach to work. That’s exactly why it is so interesting.
My personal challenge nowadays is to free myself from self-imposed limits; something that a few years ago I didn’t even realize was happening
GDN: Can you elaborate further on this process?
Joaquim: As our metabolism slows down over the years, it allows us to appreciate things differently — such as making us more observant. It’s not that we didn’t look at some things before, but as we mature, although our eyesight may get worse, we tend to get a lot more information from what we actually see. This information is valuable because it allows us to acquire new work tools.
This large amount of information adds up in a way that educates our taste; but, if we are not careful, it also shapes us a certain way. For me, the challenge nowadays is to be able — when I have a new task at hand — to free myself from those limits; something that a few years ago I didn’t even realize was happening.
GDN: Last but not least, are there any other interesting innovations and projects you would like to tell us about?
Joaquim: We are currently developing several projects, in very different areas of interest. From architecture to design, we are convinced that soon, we will be able to make substantial contributions so that everyone can enjoy a life of much higher quality.
