STACBOND Scenarios | Edifício Estação: not everything new starts from scratch
Next to Aveiro’s railway station, where industrial activity once shaped the area for decades, a new architecture now emerges without turning its back on the past.
Edifício Estação, designed by Sónia Cruz Arquitectura and Rui Vieira Oliveira Arquitecto, transforms a former industrial plot into a new residential and commercial building where the memory of the place remains part of the project.
Because it is not always about starting from scratch. Sometimes, the best architecture is the kind that knows how to build on what was already there.
A new building with a story behind it
Before becoming a new urban landmark, this plot was home to two former industrial warehouses dating back to the early 20th century, located in an area historically linked to Aveiro’s railway development and industrial growth.
With their distinctive architectural language, these buildings were part of the identity of this area and of a time when the city had a very different relationship with this neighbourhood.
The intervention could have opted for complete demolition.
Instead, the project chose a different path: preserving the original façades and integrating them into the new construction, allowing the building to retain part of that memory and continue telling something about the place where it stands.
A decision that adds architectural value, but also urban value.
Because sometimes preserving does not mean looking back. It means building better.
Photography: Ivo Tavares Studio
A new skin for a new chapter
Built upon this historic foundation, a contemporary architecture now gives the building a completely new identity.
The upper façade, defined by its vertical rhythm, the depth of its planes and the ever-changing interplay of light and shadow, creates a dynamic envelope that transforms the perception of the building throughout the day.
From some angles, the new skin appears light and almost ever-changing.
From others, it creates a solid and highly defined presence within the street.
The contrast between the historic base and the new contemporary façade is precisely one of the project’s most interesting features: two different eras sharing the same architecture.
In interventions like this, the building envelope is not just an aesthetic matter. It also plays a key role in the design, durability and technical performance of the building, especially when we talk about ventilated façade solutions.
Regenerating the city without erasing its identity
The project results in a mixed-use building comprising:
- 4 commercial and service units on the ground floor
- 15 residential units on the upper floors
- Shared basement parking
The building represents a way of understanding urban regeneration where the city is not reinvented through rupture, but through evolution.
An intervention that recovers part of the character of the place and adapts it to new ways of living, maintaining a connection between past and present.
Because architecture can also transform without erasing.
STACBOND as part of the new architectural envelope
In this new interpretation of the building, STACBOND becomes part of the contemporary architectural envelope that redefines the image of the project.
With a STB-406/Bronze Metallic finish and FR core, the solution supports a proposal where the new façade brings lightness, precision and a contemporary aesthetic, integrating into a project that combines industrial memory with new residential architecture.
As part of an aluminium composite panel solution for architecture, STACBOND contributes to an envelope that not only delivers technical performance, but also enhances the expression of the building and its relationship with its surroundings.
Technical sheet
- Project: Edifício Estação
- Location: Aveiro, Portugal
- Architecture: Sónia Cruz Arquitectura + Rui Vieira Oliveira Arquitecto
- Photography: Ivo Tavares Studio
- STACBOND finish: STB-406/Bronze Metallic
- Core: FR
- Use: Residential + commercial / services
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