Thousands of young architects are lining up for a race for work, a race that will only get more competitive with the current economic crisis. A crisis, which, in addition to making working life more difficult for these young people, also brings problems for the work of the great architects who exhibit their art to the whole world

The talent of these young architects may be end up being shut out because of this crisis, leading to them going abroad, where they can then try to find success. This departure can be turned into something positive, in that it can be a way of spreading our talent to other parts of the world. 

But should it not be our own country that appreciates our work? Should it not be our own country giving us a chance to show what we are worth? Should it not be our country welcoming us with open arms, knowing that we can improve it through our work? We finish our degree course and are ready to give everything we have, all our capacity to work, all our will to learn more and more each day – our readiness for the world of work. Despite this readiness, it is not here in Portugal that we can show it; it is not Portugal that will give us an opportunity; it is not in Portugal that our worth will be recognised. Even the Portuguese architects of great renown are recognised outside the country first and only later in their country of birth. Shouldn’t it be the other way round?

This crisis affects us all: it affects the art; it affects our architecture. It affects the spectacle that architecture presents us; it affects the sensations it provokes in us. In the current situation, can one produce great architecture knowing that we do not have sufficient resource to sustain it? Is this “spectacle” compromised for the near future?

It may be that, through this crisis, new concepts, ideas, paradigms and experiments will emerge that help us to overcome the difficulties we face. New resource management models may be developed in which exorbitant quantities are no longer required to produce architecture; perhaps new design principles will be established. The big architects may be able to revise their work methods together with their teams and still create even greater and more recognised works than before. Who knows? Perhaps, in the midst of this worldwide crisis, architecture will branch out in an even more grandiose way, with better use of the resources that exist in the world. Building at low cost, giving the opportunity to all to benefit from a new architecture, using more economic materials, but still giving them the beauty that we would have given previously.

I think it is up to the youth to create a new life-improving phase, a  more promising future. Basically, the new archi-
tects should look at our cities and make the most of what they have to offer.

Over the course of time we have witnessed a flight to the peripheries of the cities, leaving the historic centres to die a slow death. It is up to the young architects to regenerate them, designing and idealising in a way that these historic centres become accessible for all.

The population is growing older and the large shopping centres will gradually forfeit some of their “success” as mobility becomes reduced with increased age, leading to more elderly citizens giving up visiting these spaces. It is important to bring people back to the historic zones and, in those zones, to re-establish commerce, bringing dynamism and life to the cities. It is the shops that most attract people. The people seek spaces to live in where they feel comfortable and have all the resources they need for daily life close by.

Why not regenerate a city for the young people too? Are they not the promising spirits of an improved future? Are not they the ones who revive and dynamise a city?

Proceeding from the principle that young architects may be able to design for the young people of today, the former can idealise a lifestyle that is more economic and beneficial both for humans and nature. If we design on the basis that a person does not need a car to go have a coffee at the local café or buy a newspaper, the costs for each of us are reduced, leading to a general reduction in costs. We would thus improve our natural environment, sparing it the pollution we have been subjecting it to for so many years, and also find a way around the difficulties that have emerged with the worldwide economic crisis. We may think of this as making sacrifices, but are they not sacrifices that benefit us as a whole? Would it not be better to design a different way of living that allows us to overcome the obstacles in our path?

It is important to revitalise our cities, so that they, and their histories, do not become stuck in the past. We, the youth, can breathe new life into an abandoned street and with laughter and joy can attract people back to the places they once lived in. People who abandoned their comfort zone in search of a better life. We, the youth, can give them that better life by regenerating what was once theirs.

I know that there are many architecture graduates in this country. I know the difficulties they face in trying to find work. I know that it is a help to us to be able to emigrate to emerging countries that have a lot of building to do. But, who knows, perhaps there will be architects who are able to stay here, who see and feel things the same way as I do and will try, once more, to bring the old areas of our cities back to life.

This crisis can become a revolution of ideas. |