Location: Leça de Palmeira, Portugal.
Year: 1966.
Photographs: Flickr, Veronica Aguilar, Velcro, Nancy Steiber, trevor.patt.
With its completion in 1966, the Leça Swimming Pool complex by Portuguese architect Alvaro Siza has gained recognition on a global scale. It is situated nearly entirely out of sight, sandwiched between the Atlantic Ocean and the access road that follows the shoreline. The pools reach out into the ocean and seamlessly integrate with the natural pool formations along the Atlantic coast since Siza was cautious to maintain a significant amount of the existing rock formations when planning his modern interventions into the landscape.
Guests arrive down a smooth concrete ramp that runs parallel to the road, but as they make their way towards the corridors leading to the shower rooms and changing rooms, the rough concrete walls start to block their view of the ocean and the traffic in front of them. Due to their capacity to integrate Siza’s original design with the tenets of the shifting ocean tide, the Leça Swimming Pools represent a significant period in architectural history.
A previously hidden perspective of the building becomes visible as visitors exit the changing areas and ascend a series of platforms. With the children’s pool being bordered on one edge by a curving concrete wall, a bridge, and massive rocks on another, the swimming pools are able to snuggle themselves between the expansive open ocean and the pool complex. Siza’s pool and the huge Atlantic Ocean are visually connected by the low concrete walls and natural rock formations that line its sides. The swimmer’s perception of the ocean’s vastness is enhanced by the deliberate blurring of its edge, but it also distorts their perception of this artificial boundary.
