Ricardo Bak Gordon. Architecture as Inhabited Space Between Past and Future

The Bookseries Architectural Design and History intends to explore the relationships between architectural design and the contemporary city, with a particular focus on the contexts where urban transformations relate to the preservation and promotion of historical heritage Ricardo Bak Gordon is part of the latest generation of a distinctive Portuguese community that has had a privileged position within the international architecture scene for years. Bak Gordon’s work results from the coalescence of the personal vision of the architect and the acknowledgment of the international cultural context he interacts with, drawing on a focus on permanence, which «allows man and time to inhabit these spaces, always in different ways»1. Proceeding from the tradition of the School of Porto, in his practice he takes full advantage of the use of drawing, employed as a strategical tool for investigation: the time dedicated to life drawing of the city, the people and the buildings, has taught him to linger and look at the world with a deeper attention, and thus has helped him to develop a special sensibility towards the observation of places and to understand of architectural design as a practice which needs to address a certain level of continuity with the existing context.