Revealing the Place: Sacred Architecture along the Portuguese Coastline

Abstract

Revealing the place addresses the referential role of sacred architecture elements that dot the Portuguese Atlantic coastline in contemporary architectural pedagogy and in the practice of architecture. The long Portuguese coastline, the case study of the research, is dotted with sacred architectural elements—sanctuaries, churches, chapels and crosses—oriented according to both compositional and canonical cosmological principles. The character of the space of articulation between the land and the sea is made evident by the tension between the sacred elements and the landscape. This paper addresses this relation, resorting to decomposition interpretative drawings and arguments that uncover the formal relationships between sacred architecture and the landscape, proposing an interpretative reading of the built elements that combines type and place. Furthermore, it discusses the transposition of composition principles from sacred to secular architecture, building an analogy for the typological transfer process, considering the transference of existing qualities in sacred architecture for contemporary architectural projects. The hypothesis discussed is that the decoding of the architectural composition of sacred elements in the landscape remains useful both in the pedagogy and practice of architecture. Finally, it is evidenced that this exercise allows us to transfer formal relations established between sacred buildings and the landscape for contemporary architectural practice, revealing type and topos.

1. Introduction

Revealing the place is an exercise in reading and interpreting the coastal territory and the sacred architectural elements that punctuate and define this landscape. The coastal space is indeed universally recognised as a sacred space of tension between the natural elements, the land and sea [1,2]. In this boundary space, over the years, different elements have been built [3] that reference and symbolise the sacred characteristics of the coastal landscape [4]. The landscape considered sacred reflects and preserves the fundamental ideas and values of society and serves as an important factor of continuity over time, ensuring the transmission of a wide range of historical information to future generations [5,6]. The most culturally and historically relevant sacred elements built along the coast are found in geomorphologically significant places [7], such as the mouth of a river on the sea or the edge of a promontory.

Various forms of urban appropriation have developed along coastal areas over the years, and it is estimated that more than one billion people reside within a radius of about 10 km from the coast [8]. After the Second World War, following urban reconstruction and the economic boom, the social phenomenon of mass tourism emerged along European coastal areas [9,10], a phenomenon that has stimulated the urban growth of coastal settlements [11]. In response to the growing demand of the tourist market, justified by the desire to exploit the sea and the beach as areas of leisure and entertainment, new housing, hotels and tourist facilities have been built [12].

In contemporary coastal landscapes, therefore, very different architectural and urban elements are encountered. According to the typological differentiation between serial and organic elements decoded and developed by Caniggia and Maffei [13], we can classify architectural elements according to their formal and spatial characteristics in the landscape. It is possible through Caniggia and Maffei’s research to define the architectural objects built, with a sacred function, along the coast as organic. These are classified as organic, and not as serial, because they were built in a specific place in the landscape, given by its characteristics and qualities.

In this article, case studies are the different sacred architectural elements—sanctuaries, churches, chapels and crosses—built along the Portuguese coast. The architectural elements built in specific, due to their geomorphological conformation, spaces are oriented towards the sea. The spatial arrangement in the coastal landscape confirms the sacred vocation of the element and allows it to be pre-identified, in the morphological collection and cataloguing, as organic.

Cult spaces are places rich in history [14], where oceanic mythology has, over time, been associated [15].

Starting from a selected universe of cases present along the Portuguese coast, this article draws up a type–morphological framework that allows the formal classification and spatial decoding of organic elements, sacred architectures present in the coastal landscape. The aim of the article is to decode the architectural–typological qualities in order to understand how they have become references over time and have been transposed into different architectural compositions. We highligh that the concept of sacredness is manifested in the spatial relationship, compositional principles, coherence, and precision of design across scales, adapting them to different contexts and functions, thus conferring a condition of sacredness to spaces. The founding hypothesis of the article is the idea that interpreting the typological transfer of the sacred object and its spatial relationship to the landscape in other projects and spatial contexts makes it possible to develop a pedagogically useful method for students of architecture courses. The article presents the results obtained in the design study of the fourth year (2020/2021) of the Integrated Master’s in Architecture at the School of Architecture in Lisbon, in which the architectural design of a nautical club between the village and the port of Sesimbra, the Casa das Marés [House of the Tides], used as a compositional reference the metrics of the Santuário de Nossa Senhora do Cabo Espichel, a sacred organic element built on a promontory adjacent to the sea.

In conclusion, it is argued that the interpretative reading of the chapels and sanctuaries along the coast, as a whole or individually, allows for the typological transfer [16] of existing qualities in sacred architecture into the programmes of contemporary architecture.

2. The Portuguese Coastline

The Portuguese mainland coastline stretches for about 943 km, where about 70% of the population lives [17], a percentage that rises to about 80% in the summer months, thanks to the phenomenon of tourism [18,19]. The Portuguese coast in its extension is characterised by different geomorphological types of coastline, wide sandy beaches backed by dunes, high cliffs, bays, estuaries, lagoons and barrier islands [20]. Most of the coastline, from the River Minho in the Northwest to the Guadiana in the Southeast, is characterised by low, sandy beaches interrupted by cliffs no more than 100 m high, as described by Orlando Ribeiro in his text Portugal, o Mediterrâneo e o Atlântico of 1945 [21]. According to Ferreira et al. [20], nowadays, estuaries and coastal lagoons will be the coastal areas most affected by sea level rise; these include the Sado and Tagus estuaries and the coastal lagoons of Ria de Aveiro and Ria Formosa [20]. Moreover, along sandy coastal areas, changes in shoreline position (due to erosion and accretion phenomena) are expected to occur in response to changes in sea level, sediment balance and hydrodynamic conditions [22].

However, over time, the geomorphological characteristics of the coastal territory, combined with a mild climate, have turned the Portuguese coast into one of Europe’s best natural resources, widely exploited for tourism purposes since the 1960s [23]. The social and economic activities, which take place in urban agglomerations built along the coastline, are mainly related to the interaction between humans and the maritime landscape: fishing, port and tourist and recreational activities. These are activities that have succeeded one another and have over time formed, transformed and consolidated the urban landscape; indeed, social and economic necessity together with the desire to live by the sea has encouraged the construction of architectural and urban elements. Among the architectural and urban elements present in the coastal landscape, the religious elements differ in form and relation to the territory, as places of ancestral memory [24,25]. These are elements which, as points and lines on the surface of the landscape, have defined and composed the form of the coastal territory.

2.1. Elements along the Coast

The different architectural objects one encounters along the coastal strip, whether located on a high promontory or on the shallow, sandy shore, were built both to observe the sea and to be observed from the sea. Indeed, walking along the coast, it is possible to draw up a collection of architectural objects, both ancient and contemporary, located in isolated places in the coastal territory or close to the urban landscape, all of which, despite their typological differentiation, are intrinsically connected to the maritime landscape in the background.

In this research, the form of built heritage for religious purposes—such as churches, chapels and votive altars—is analysed in relation to the coastal landscape. Elements marking the spatial distance in the coastline and located on a rocky massif or on low-lying land become references and orientation for those reaching the mainland from the sea, as well as for long pilgrimage journeys across the land. Architectural elements built in particular places, distinguished by their geomorphologic characteristics, stand out in the coastal landscape, as they reflect the culture, history and memory of the site. “From the point of view of the socio-cultural approach, the sacred landscape is a territorial system, which, at a certain point of its development, interacts with man, forms in them a set of ideas, beliefs, and feelings that affect historical and socio-cultural processes [5]”.

It is believed that churches, chapels and altars, due to their form and location in the territory, may be defined as organic elements according to the theory of Caniggia and Maffei. In the text, Architectural composition and building typology: Interpreting Basic Building, the authors affirm that “organic indicates the nature of an aggregation consisting of elements identified on account of their peculiar position and shape [13]” and similarly, these elements are characterised by a peculiar form, not repeatable or interchangeable in the territory. The definition outlined by the two authors therefore makes it possible to classify architectural objects built with a religious function and deeply connected to the landscape to which they belong as organic elements. Architectural objects therefore take on a symbolic value within the territory they are embedded in, beyond the original function for which they were built, such as “a sacred place constitutes a break in the homogeneity of space [26]”. Therefore, we might argue that sacred architecture becomes a landmark (Figure 1).

The Organic Elements: Types and Topos

The spatial relationship established between the organic elements and the landscape—the coast, the land and the sea—takes on a spiritual dimension that can be read in the form of the architectural object regarding the place. In the cult spaces located in the lands of finisterra, the dialogue with the genius loci [27] with oceanic mythology, is more evident [15]. Indeed, the stories of the formation and construction of sacred objects have their roots in legends and folktales that endure in time and substantiate the built elements.

The churches and chapels built along the coast, dedicated to maritime and fishing culture, emplaced along the Portuguese Atlantic coast—stretching from the river Minho to the Cabo de São Vicente promontory—facing towards the sea. The disposition of the chapel in the territory establishes an intense relationship with the sea. The organic elements, although built in different geomorphological contexts—on the edge of the promontory, on the high, rocky coast or on the beach next to the sea level—interweave with the locus a diachronic relationship, where the type meets the topos. According to Mishchenko [5], the perception and classification of sacred landscapes can be constructed by five principles as: morphological, genetic, time, spatial, and quantitative. However, regardless of the classification decoded by Mischenko, in the following article, the research question calls for a classificatory approach in which the characteristics of form, of the sacred object, are cross-referenced with landscape characteristics. Through this classification, it is possible to decode the qualities of the landscape as a sacred place.

A representative sample of these sacred elements can be considered in the scope of this article, punctuating the Portuguese coast (Figure 1).

Notable examples of organic elements built on promontories include (from north to south): Ermida da Memória (Nazaré); Santuário de Nossa Senhora dos Remédios (Cabo Carvoeiro, Peniche); Santuário de Nossa Senhora do Cabo Espichel (Cabo Espichel, Sesimbra); Igreja de Nossa Senhora da Graça (Sagres); and Capela de Nossa Senhora da Rocha (Porches).

On the high, rocky coast, the urban settlements Capela de São Sebastião (Ericeira) and Capela de Nossa Senhora do Mar (Zambujeira do Mar) can be mentioned.

Finally, Capela da Boa Nova (Leça Palmeira), Capela do Senhor da Pedra (Miramar) and Capela de Nossa Senhora da Guia (Vila do Conde) are built on the low, sandy beach close to the built-up area. In these territories the tension is made evident through sacred architectural elements, isolated or adjacent to villages, usually combining the sacred building with an enclosure: a sacred open ground (Figure 2).

The initial subdivision of the organic elements according to the place on which they are built can be further articulated and subdivided according to the relationship of the architectural type to the topos. Indeed, the organic elements relate to the place through their orientation in the territory, i.e., according to the canonical East–West orientation respected until the 16th century—before the reform of the Second Vatican Council [28]. The canonical orientation required the apse to face east, so chapels built before the 16th century along the Atlantic coast appear to be arranged perpendicular to the coastline.

However, some of the organic elements with a religious function, even though they are disposed perpendicular to the coastline, do not face the chapel eastwards, but westwards. One example is Igreja de Nossa Senhora da Lapa in Póvoa de Varzim, whose west-facing apse, facing the seascape, received a lighthouse in the 19th century.

Looking at the south coast of Portugal, this topological rule seems to be lacking, as it is only if the organic elements were built before the 16th century that they are disposed parallel to the coastline. Following the fall of the canonical orientation, the organic elements began to be disposed according to orientations present in the landscape, invariably towards the sea.

The topos between land and sea provides and appeals to moments of articulation and arrival, which invite us on a journey through the sacred space to the sea. This is a path connected by two extremes: those who come from the sea and those who walk by land find organic elements [13], small chapels located in the coastal landscape, which fill the chest to the sea and give hope to the fishermen. In the organic elements [13], adjacent to the sea, this idea of travel is quite evident, being open to the land and not to the sea, allowing for a sense of comfort offered by the human scale.

Finally, moving from the scale of territorial observation to the scale of the urban landscape, we can observe to which architectural typology the organic elements [13], built along the coast, belong. Namely, they can be classified on the form of their plan: central plan or nave (Figure 3 and Figure 4).

On a more approximate scale, we can observe whether the elements relate to the urban area through a mediating architectural element such as the narthex or a churchyard. From the territorial relationship established between the religious elements and the urban landscape, it is still possible to decode the underlying compositional principles, design coherence and precision at the different scales of design necessary for architectural composition. The sacred building thus becomes a formal reference, a fixed point through which to read the transformation of the landscape. Purini argues that through architecture, design and composition [29], it is possible to place an imprint in the urban landscape capable of transforming the place, applying the type in the topos. The result of the dual relationship given by the application of the typology on territorial support is the definition of the urban landscape as the protagonist of the transformation or metamorphosis of the type over time.

2.2. The Sanctuary of Nossa Senhora do Cabo

The orientation and disposition of the organic elements on the territory establishes an intense relationship with the urban landscape and the natural territory, the sea. The encounter between land and sea provides and summons moments of articulation between the urban elements in the landscape. The Sanctuary of Nossa Senhora do Cabo Espichel is situated in the Portuguese coastal territory open to the land and not to the sea, providing comfort to the human being in front of the places of finisterra. Indeed, the Sanctuary fits into the urban landscape and the territory through a public space, an enclosed square, that mediates the tension between the land and the sea. Moreover, the square is an urban element that evidences the historical and symbolic value of the sacred buildings in the topos. The temple becomes a central piece crowning the great public square [15]. Indeed, the Barbarium Promontorium, where the Sanctuary is located, was transformed into a landscape of worship and devotion, where the human inscribes the transformation in the nature of the place itself.

The Sanctuary has undergone a morphological evolution over the years, adapted to the changing needs of society over time. The Memory Chapel arises from the legend of an apparition near the cliffs, providing the beginning of a religious cult on the Espichel promontory. The chapel, already in a deteriorated state, became insufficient to accommodate the large affluence of pilgrims. It was from this necessity that, in 1495, the Church of Nossa Senhora do Cabo was built in a place near the hermitage. In the proximity of the temple and around the old church, the accommodation of the pilgrims was built in a disorderly and spontaneous enclosure, later closed at the western edge by the Fort of Nossa Senhora do Cabo, near the chapel. According to John Eade “pilgrimage is understood as a kinetic ritual that allows people to involve itself with the immanent characteristics of the landscape and reveal the power of the sacred place [30]”.

In 1701, the construction of a new church began, more distant from the chapel of memory. It is from the lack of means that the old church was destroyed to support the construction of the new and current church of the Sanctuary “This attitude, of destruction of a church to build another, due to the scarcity of material and ensuring a rapid construction, comes to ensure the Sanctuary of Cabo a possibility of progressive and orderly growth, later materialised [15]”. However, out of respect for the old church, the enclosure remained near the chapel of memory. At the end of 1794, the Sanctuary acquired its present form [15].

The morphological evolution of Cabo Espichel has as its main element the chapel of memory. The desire to dedicate oneself to the lands of the end originated the development of the first enclosure of the promontory, closed by the shelters of the pilgrims. Therefore, we can affirm that the sacred nature of the shape stems from the form of the place itself. However, with the evolution and the development of the site, the enclosure acquired a new composition due to the needs of time that caused the architecture to shape the sacred space.

3. The Typological Transfer

“Sacred space has an existential value for man [26]”. There is an intimate and profound relation between man and the sacred space. The possibility of transferring spatial qualities that exist in sacred spaces to contemporary profane architecture allows us to answer the need to perpetuate the idealisation and composition of the sacred in a critical and creative way. With this premise, we may consider that the sacredness of a space manifests itself as a formal composition, which allows the development of new pedagogical approaches. According to the idea of typological transfer, as proposed by Emanuel Christ and Christoph Gantenbein, “a typological principle is abstract and general and hence not bound to one location, even though the type ensues from a highly specific constellation of cultural, climatic, and economic factors and provisions under building law. The transfer option is therefore inherent to every building type [16]”. Thus, it is possible to transfer compositional matrices and primordial forms, adapting them to new places, and we might add other functions (Figure 5, Figure 6 and Figure 7). Indeed, typology is a systematic study which includes actions such as “abstraction, reduction and schematization” to identify and clarify the phenomenon that a researcher has in every field; it is the discussion of the special one which is generalised by mind [31]. In conclusion, as Bandini [32] wrote, through the typological exercise it is possible to research architectural ideas as far as they become convention.

Over time, the Sanctuary of Nossa Senhora do Cabo Espichel, as an organic element in the landscape, has become a reference for the architectural composition of different urban and architectural objects disposed between the land and the sea, and even beyond it. Indeed, in the architectural composition of the Hotel do Mar, in the nearby village of Sesimbra, the Sanctuary influenced the conception of the building’s form.

In an interview to José Fonseca e Costa, conducted in February 2015 by Aniki magazine, he reproduced as architect Conceição e Silva explained the references for the hotel composition: “The first part of the hotel was already built, and he explained to me why he had built it. The hotel is built on a terrace in the mountains, it is embedded in the mountains. And he said to me–Now come and see the things I was inspired by. Then he takes me down to the fishermen’s harbour, where those boxes of fish are and stuff. If you look at the way it’s arranged and then look at his architecture, he was clearly inspired by that” [33,34].

“Well, now let’s go for a walk. We went for a walk to Cabo Espichel, and suddenly you realise that everything he does is deeply rooted in elements that have to do with that region, where he was building that hotel [12,34]”. In the words used by architect Conceição e Silva to describe the Hotel do Mar project, although not exclusively, we recognise a conscious and declared choice of compositional reference with the Cabo Espichel Sanctuary.

The correspondence of the design reference of the Sanctuary with the Hotel do Mar (the project dates from 1956, although construction began in 1962) can be observed in the architectural composition. In very much the same way the two wings of the Sanctuary are composed by modular units that correspond to the pilgrim’s houses, the hotel is also built from the aggregation of modular units, in this case the bedrooms. The architect in fact deconstructs the idea of the hotel on the beach as a monolithic volume aligned with the coastline, reducing it to its smallest component—the hotel room—as a compositional module. Subsequently, the module is juxtaposed and inserted into the slope of the lot facing the sea, tracing its topography. Continuous linear terraces resulted from this movement, then were divided by walls into small individual balconies that extend the private, more secluded, with space of each unit to the exterior opening to the sea view [35].

The repetition of the modules and the rationalisation of the structure confers a rhythm and inscribes the two buildings in a common parsimonious principle of composition, allowing for the repetition to reveal a precise metric in the composition of both cases. Only the exceptional spaces, the church and the opera house in the Sanctuary and the entrance, bar, restaurant and pool in the Hotel, stand out and emphasise the composition rule.

Although the relation was never consciously acknowledged by the architect, we may also infer a relation between the Sanctuary and Álvaro Siza’s project for the Superior Education School of Setúbal (Escola Superior de Educação de Setúbal). Observing Álvaro Siza’s project for Setúbal (1993), we can read the repetition of modules juxtaposed on two parallel lines to create a patio enclosing a tree between them, open on one of the two other sides, with an evident likeness to the Sanctuary enclosure in Cabo Espichel. In the absence of a cross in the middle, a tree marks and references the patio. The large transverse space of the school forms the central core of the building from which the galleries develop. Two wings of the two-storey building define the access route to the large hall, which connects the two routes, following a perpendicular axis. The structural metric of the portico, with a precise rhythm, similarly to the Sanctuary arcades, regulates the partition of the inner rooms that compose the two wings of the school. All the exceptional spaces of the school are juxtaposed to the external part of the patio composition, thus replicating a composition system that exists in the Sanctuary, preserving the rhythmic rule of the portico in the patio and conferring an autonomy to these exceptional elements, although integrated in the orthogonal grid that regulates the composition (Figure 8 and Figure 9).

4. The Sacred in Architecture: Pedagogy and Project

In both cases, directly assuming it in the case of Conceição e Silva and perhaps subliminally in the case of Álvaro Siza, architectural composition principles present in a sacred ensemble were decoded, transferred and critically recreated in the design of another form in different contexts. Moreover, when different periods are examined, it is possible to share the information about the relation with the built environment created with the society’s owned culture and the location where the built environment is through these historical layers [31]. In these projects, with temporal and functional realities that were different from the ones of the reference model, the transference is never direct, but rather an understanding of design composition principles that were transferred and critically applied in new compositions. Indeed, the typology, as a method, as Bandini [32] writes, makes it possible to decode the transformation process of cities and to understand and replicate urban phenomena. A key factor in both of them was the precise understanding of the place, for example, the topographical configuration of the slope where Hotel do Mar was inserted, or the precise orientation and the topography modelling where the Escola Superior de Educação is emplaced.

If we consider this process a valid methodology for the exercise of architecture [35,36,37], we can assume that in architecture pedagogy a similar approach also has value. As we saw, the different elements that dot the territory next to the sea can be catalogued and classified, typified in order to become an abstract reference, a composition principle that carries the formal qualities of their values of resistance and atemporality. Therefore, if we imagine the transformation of the landscape through the process of typological transference [16] it is possible to use the same formal composition principle or rule to create a space that houses a distinct function. According to the authors, the typological transfer [16], besides being an urban issue, allows the cultural transfer for the design of new interventions in the territory.

The composition principle for the House of the Tides project arises from the cultural and formal understanding of the Sanctuary of Nossa Senhora do Cabo Espichel. Designed in the bay of Sesimbra, it bridges the two realities that co-exist: the coastal village and the port. With the intention of articulating both the part of the village (leisure) and the part of the port (the place of work) in a fluid and continuous path between land and sea, it was necessary to work on the relationship with the nature of this place, which is strongly marked by the Macorrilho and Alcatraz hills that sit on the beach and on the sea.

Although the House of the Tides functional program refers to a nautical club, the search for a formal reference that could respond to such an intense contact between land and sea constituted the Sanctuary of Nossa Senhora do Cabo Espichel as a typological reference for the composition of this nautical club proposed in the coastal village of Sesimbra. The sacred ensemble enclosure has therefore become the basis for the composition of the House of the Tides, initially as a college, but evolving to a typification of the form of the Sanctuary in order to create a rule for the composition of the nautical club. The choice of the place is always the first operation of composition.

The academic project of the House of the Tides, fitted on the line that divides land and sea, seeks an intense relationship with one of the nearby hills. In the case of the Barbarium Promontorium of Cabo Espichel, the Sanctuary is revealed on the planaltic surface, in the village of Sesimbra; the placement of the House of the Tides near the sea surface inverts the relation and the promontory is framed by the wings of the built enclosure, as if the hill occupies the place of the Sanctuary church. The referential focal point of the wings of the House of the Tides then replaces the sacred building by the topographic element that interferes in the enclosure’s strict composition and subtracts part of it, keeping the hills intact.

Although the religious element is oriented according to the cosmological alignment, east–west, in the academic exercise, a spatial disposition according to the landscape configuration was chosen, placing the topos at the centre of the design choices.

Nevertheless, the Sanctuary opens to the land, eastwards, and the House of the Tides opens to the sea, southwards, and the proportion of the square facing the land on the Sanctuary transfers directly to the water square of the House of the Tides. The formal definition of the Sanctuary enclosure is abstracted and transferred for the composition of the wings that support the piers. It is here that we realise that these typologies are highly adaptable regarding both place and function. A ceremonial square that embraces the end of the pilgrimage path with the church becomes a water square that faces the sea, embracing the boats and framing the hill of Macorrilho. In the coastal landscape, the Sanctuary was a point of reference for pilgrims, and in the same way, the project metaphorically refers to the arrival of the boats as that of the pilgrims.

The Sanctuary also becomes a reference for the precise metric of the spaces of the House of the Tides. The tectonic frame of the House of the Tides refers to the arcades rhythm of the Sanctuary wings made of the pilgrims’ houses, also creating a continuous gallery along the piers. Again, a transference from the galleries that run along the Sanctuary wings (Figure 10).

In this place of finisterra the transfer of the composition of the Sanctuary to the House of the Tides was an ally to constitute several points of reference within the place. The academic exercise confirmed the possibility of a typological transfer [16] from sacred architecture to a profane program. The typological abstraction of composition rules from a sacred ensemble, transferring them to a different place, time and function, enabled us to highlight how architecture shapes the sacred. The importance of the usefulness of sacred architecture in contemporary architectural design is therefore considered a fundamental issue to be discussed and introduced into pedagogical methods as an exercise [35,36,37]. That is, an exercise that highlights the ability to transfer the quality and exceptionality of the sacred to the formal design of a project. It is from the possibility of the morphological and cultural understanding of a site that the materialisation of new urban and architectural responses is possible. The sacred space as the beginning of a contemporary architectural design opens a possibility of intervening in these finisterra lands; as such, pedagogies can still be effective tools for testing design skills and the expressiveness of forms and materials. It is from the understanding of form, proportion, time, culture, and place that these typologies offer us timelessness, resistance and adaptability for the design of contemporary architecture, giving them meaning and respecting places and people [37] (Figure 11).

5. Conclusions

The methodological and propaedeutic exercise of reading [38] and decoding the morphological and typological characteristics of the organic elements [13] in the landscape, and the sacred objects in the places of finisterra, makes it possible in the first place to reveal the spirit of the place [27]. In that, the sacredness of the architectural object is not defined by the function for which it was designed, but by the formal relations it establishes with the territory. Starting from the reading of the formal characteristics and their collection in typological classes, it is possible, through the process of architectural composition, to transfer the qualities to a designed object. To conclude, typological thoughts and actions presuppose two things: first, to recognise and discover basic types; second, the ability to see things in complementary relationships [39].

As a final remark, we should remember Álvaro Siza’s warning to the stone mason building the stereotomy in the Marco de Canaveses Church, “With the sacred, no playing around”, which reminds us of the precision of the project and the sacred condition of the space that architects aim to design. Moreover, to Álvaro Siza’s warning we would add that you should strive to design it and reveal the place [40].