Text description provided by the architects. The new Universidade do Vale do Rio do Sinos campus in Porto Alegre occupies an entire 13,000 m? block located on one of the city’s most valued commercial axes, in front of a traditional school maintained by the same Jesuit congregation.

The program was divided into four units: Educational, Theater, Services and Parking.

The Educational building is the most important of the set, with 10 floors, 2 of them underground, located on the corner with better visibility. The building was retracted from the road creating an access esplanade and allowing a better perspective of the whole. There are 90 classrooms, library, administration, study spaces, and socializing areas.

The access esplanade is an important space of articulation, visually integrating the services sector, the access lobby. and the students’ patio, flanked by a grandstand that reinforces this visual contact and creates spaces where for gathering.

The theater, for 470 spectators, occupies a volume located in front of the Educational building, next to the corner, of its three floors, only one is above the level of the ground, subtly marking its presence. The stage sits on the same level as the students’ courtyard, and has a 14.00 m door allowing the performance of spectacles with the public outdoors.

Longitudinal perspective section

The footbridge crosses the avenue and interconnects the Campus with the School, is an organizing element, separating the service area from the education building. It is a metallic structure, coated with expanded aluminum plate, transparent and light.

The service sector is the great living space, occupying two floors, accessible by the footbridge, or through the esplanade, or the public sidewalk, integrating the university with urban space.

The facade of the service sector is a green wall, measuring 80.00 X 11.00 m, which aims to rebuild visually the vegetation removed due to the widening of the road, it is one of the icon of the project.

The thousand parking spaces occupy four underground floors, taking advantage in part of the natural unevenness of the terrain, a fundamental strategy for a subtle implantation in the block, with wide sidewalks and distances that allow to contemplate the architecture.

© Marcelo Donadussi

• Architects

  AT Arquitetura

• Location

  Av Nilo Pecanha 1600, Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil

• Category

  University

• Authors

  Andre Detanico, Tarso Carneiro, Mauricio Ceolin

• Team

  AT Arquitetura

• Area

  602778.98 ft2

• Project Year

  2017

• Photographs

  Marcelo Donadussi