Hotel in Portuguese Penafiel by AND-RÉ architecture

Already last year, a pair of Porto architects, Bruno André and Francisco Salgado Ré, completed the intimate hotel complex Lobo Blanco (White Wolf) in Penafiel in northern Portugal. The architects aimed for visitors to “experience the slowing of time here, to begin listening to the rustling of the wind, to enjoy the song of birds echoing from the surrounding forests all day long, and to observe the bubbling water flowing through the place.” The individual rooms are divided into separate small houses, but the entire complex operates as a whole interconnected by a system of sunken gravel paths. The white houses are loosely arranged around a saltwater pool. Archetypal forms with gabled roofs are set one meter below the ground, so the continuous window sill in the hotel rooms is aligned with the level of the lawn. In the sunken ground floor of each room, there is a communal area with a kitchen, and the bedrooms are located in the attic, where skylights open up to the sky. Simple shapes, the absence of detail, and the proximity to nature are meant to evoke feelings of tranquility, where guests can at least temporarily forget the hustle and bustle of the big city.