BEST SOLUTIONS – The Green House: a 36 sqm holiday home in Porto

Our owner asked the architects of Urbastudios in Porto, Portugal, to turn this space into a special mini-apartment to be rented out to four/ five people visiting the city, one of those places you want to come back to or recommend to friends. So, on the third and last floor of a late nineteenth century building, coming up to the river Douro in the historic heart of this beautiful Portuguese town, an extremely unique thirty six square metre space was born: the Green House. Like its architect Nuno Alves de Carvalho points out, it’s a surprise as well as a contradiction.

It looks like a little house with a front yard, almost like a patio or a courtyard. This was precisely the concept behind this project: to pack bedroom and services in one half of the loft, freeing up the other side, to be used as a living room for entertaining guests. 

The entire bedroom quarter is in green, every surface, floors, walls and ceiling are clad in painted MDF. The downstairs bathroom is in a blind spot, but it’s still lit from above, there’s a galley kitchen along the entrance corridor and the first of the two bedrooms with a double mattress simply placed on a raised platform. Simple timber slats form a subtle vertical screen for a minimum amount of privacy.

The nineteenth century roof structure was still in its original state. The second mezzanine bedroom was achieved by removing the ceiling thus gaining 13 sqm.

The city of Porto absolutely deserves a visit: the historic town centre on the river, the old coffee shops and the extraordinary Lello & Irmão bookshop which dates from 1869. It’s widespread that this bookshop inspired JK Rowling, while she was teaching English in the city, to depict one of the most iconic places in all of the Harry Potter books, and if you come here there won’t be any doubt about that. Contemporary architecture is also present with the magnificent Casa da Música, a masterpiece by Rem Koolhaas. You really should go, and staying at the Green House would be the cherry on the cake of a most memorable trip!